Madness Takes It's Toll by Sian1359 (Skeevy Ancients Challenge)
Title: Madness Takes Its Toll
Author: Sian1359
For the SGA Flashfic Skeevy Ancients Challenge
Rating: Teen appropriate (language and sexual situations)
Word Count: ~4,200
Genre: Action/Adventure
Spoilers: Anything from all seasons could be in play -- takes place after Enemy At The Gate and SG1: Ark of Truth
Warnings: None
Disclaimer: Stargate Atlantis characters, et al have been borrowed for the duration of the fan effort, with only the deepest love and appreciation behind the intent. No disrespect is intended.
Notes: Title taken from The Rocky Horror Picture Show's Time Warp
Summary: Trouble doesn't end just because the Wraith were thwarted.
When the SGC backed the IOA's refusal to let John (or anyone) fly Atlantis back to the Pegasus Galaxy right away, Rodney was the first to predict dire consequences. To begin with, the longer the city floated just outside San Francisco Bay, the likelier they'd be discovered; the government and Coast Guard could only claim a toxic spill and reroute sea traffic for so long before someone called them on it. Before some adventurer -- or eco-warrior -- tried to sneak out to get exclusive footage on what certain elements were already calling a dodge and a cover-up.
John figured Stargate Command was pushing for full disclosure about the Stargate, intelligent aliens and past staved off invasion attempts while the IOA kept cautioning that the world wasn't ready. Or maybe it was the reverse between them since the US would probably lose a lot of its control over the program once the rest of the world was clued in. Everyone expected a certain amount of chaos after disclosure, but a secret that big … Frankly, that they'd been able to keep the lid on it for this long given all of the apocalypses narrowly averted -- the Wraith just being the latest -- boggled John's mind. If the Powers That Be were caught out without a plan in place, the chaos, accusations and vie for control would only be that much worse.
Closer to home, there was also the fear for Teyla and the few other Athosians who'd elected to stay in Atlantis after they were recovered from Michael's depravations and were now separated from Halling and the rest of their friends and families. Ronon was also stranded of course, and while he'd irrefutably made Atlantis his home after Tyre's death, that didn't mean he'd never change his mind and decide to rejoin the remnants of his people -- or some other civilization back in Pegasus. John didn't see the SGC diverting one of the X-304s from their future tasks in the Milky Way Galaxy just because a few people got homesick -- not if they didn't need to send the Daedalus, the Apollo or the Phoenix to make those forty day resupply trips into Pegasus any longer.
A more immediate and direct concern was, in now being on Earth, the city and the expedition were entirely too accessible to the overseers. For the last two days they'd been entertaining the entire IOA Council, other special guests and assorted family members - not families of the expedition, but of their watchdogs. Including the daughter of France's representative, a precocious fifteen year old with the damn ATA gene, that John and a team of Marines had been saddled with keeping entertained. Currently they were escorting through one of the explored but uninhabited areas of Atlantis so she could make things light up (things that shouldn't blow up in their faces). Francesca DeSalle was running zig-zag along one of the long corridors John and Rodney used to race the RC models, slapping her hands against the walls and the lamps, pretty much ignoring John's suggestion that she slow down. Ignoring his warning that she was going to run into a bulkhead just around the corner if she didn't.
Only the lights then started to chime in the same tones like those which had been the key to unlocking Janis' secret lab a few months back.
Tapping his R/T to contract Rodney, John also picked up his own speed and reached for Francesca's shoulder. Just as Francesca skidded to a stop in front of the bulkhead, the hand she'd flung out disappeared through it. When John started to tug her back, her initial excitement turned into angry French curses loud enough to drown out Rodney's pissy response over interrupting him. Curses then became a scream of fear and pain when Francesca couldn't free her hand. John had just enough time to tell Rodney ‘time dilation field' before he stopped pulling and started pushing.
Mother fucking son of a god damn bitch!
"Ow, shit! What the fuck was that?" Francesca pounded on John as she pulled herself off of him.
He'd more or less managed to cushion her from their fall into the secret room, not sure if the spike of pain through his body was from passing through the field or maybe he'd just banged his elbow. While he couldn't be sure they'd actually gone through a time dilation field, this one had felt different from the barrier outside the last hidden lab that Daniel had found for them - and significantly different than the security fields the Ancient's set up for incarceration areas. It certainly didn't hurt as badly as the known time dilation field back on Teer's planet, but he also hadn't fought against passing through it, so it wasn't like the cells in his body had been out of synch with each other like the last time.
Francesca wasn't doubled over either, though she was trying to shake out and massage her hand. Of course, that could have been because she'd also started banging against the area they'd passed through, which was again a solid bulkhead.
John started looking around for another set of lights or a control panel -
"What did you do, Colonel? Where is the opening?"
"It's a security failsafe," John said confidently, although he felt anything but; no sense in mentioning that there might not be a normal way out. Or how months if not years could have passed outside this room before they found one.
"You-you speak French?" she suddenly squeaked - in English.
He grinned and drew her away from the wall, for once grateful for the private language tutors he and Dave had had to endure while growing up. Embarrassment was easier to deal with than panic.
"I understand it better than I speak it," he stayed speaking French, using a little of the charm that Rodney always rolled his eyes at to try and keep her calm. "I have to say I was pretty impressed at your creativity on the other side of the wall."
Oops, instead of making her feel more comfortable, at his mention of the wall she turned her attention back to it and started pounding on it again.
"Hey, Francesca, don't worry. We've run into this kind of thing before," John worked on reassuring her again. "Rod - Doctor McKay is already on the way. He'll figure it out."
God, John hoped Rodney would. This room could have been a carbon copy of numerous other labs they'd found scattered around the city, with nothing noteworthy about it - certainly nothing to indicate why it was behind a time dilation or security or some other kind of forcefield. John had already turned down ascension twice, and wasn't anymore ready to contemplate it now than he'd been with Chaya or Teer had asked him to join with them. Especially not when he had someone else depending on him. Francesca might be a little rash and rebellious but those traits didn't deserve some kind of death sentence.
He could be wrong about it being a time dilation field anyway. One-way doors had been Scotty Peterson's favorite trick in his high school D&D games (more than one expedition scientist had speculated that E. Gary Gygax had obviously been an Ancient given all of the other elements of the game that had seemed to come to life in Pegasus). Certainly there didn't seem to be any ‘monsters of the id' in here to have to overcome --
"How extraordinary," a man suddenly appeared from behind the wall opposite the one they'd come through. "You're not my people. Are you a hallucination?"
John shifted Francesca behind him but refrained from pulling his sidearm. So far. By the man's dress, he was an Ancient, but walking through walls --
"We're real. Are you?" John wasn't sure why he was so surprised; the last time he'd passed through a time dilation field he'd found a whole colony of people all spending their lives learning how to ascend. If the Ancients had the tech to put together that type of situation on another planet, undoubtedly doing it within Atlantis herself would be a snap. But the thought of one living simultaneously with them over the last five years -- unknown -- was not something John wanted to consider. There was another possibility…
"I don't suppose you're just a hologram? Like the one Morgan pretended to be?
The Ancient shook his head. "You met dear Morgan? As a hologram? She and Myrddin always did have a flare for theatrics, trying to up one another. How, no, when …" he frowned and looked at them again, this time with the same type of expression Rodney's face held when he was puzzled by new Ancient tech. Like he was surprised by not knowing what was before him, given he was the foremost authority.
"This is Francesca DeSalle and I'm Lieutenant Colonel John Sheppard," John managed while his brain (and heart) screamed at him. He'd thrown out Morgan's name, not really expecting a hit, and certainly not with a return like Myrddin. From all he'd read of SG1's reports about their search for the Sangraal and Morgan's subsequent sacrifice to stop the Ori, Morgan and Myrddin had been a couple of heavy hitters back in the days when the Ancients interfered with Earth's development. By the way this Ancient spoke of them, he was a contemporary - or even older.
John was pretty sure this guy was also not Ascended but stuck on the material plane; he'd learned the signs over the years and this one doesn't feel like Chaya. More like Helia, only Atlantis hadn't been traveling at near the speed of light for thousands of years like Helia's ship had been, to keep this one alive in relativistic time. So it was a time dilation field inside this room, one John feared was the reverse of his last one and one so far out of synch with the rest of Atlantis that it was already be too late to return from and find Rodney and the others even alive.
"Oh, you're Elizabeth's people," the man suddenly lit up. "So our little plan and subterfuge did work." Now that he'd identified them in his mind, the Ancient began muttering and seemed to turn inward, continuing to talk to himself while his eyes shifted around the room. "I was sure I reset the alarm after the third switch out, but I suppose -"
The Ancient - Janis -- John was now pretty sure, pushed away from the wall, striding not toward them but instead moving to a table that held a small, innocuous looking box with no discernable features that John had found during his own, albeit brief, search. Janis tinkered with it for a few seconds, still talking to himself, but this time in his own language (or at least one John maybe recognized but couldn't understand). Eventually he had a Rodney type of ah-ha moment and snapped his fingers twice before adjusting something and turning back to face them.
John had kind of his own ah-ha moment, but he wasn't ready to call it such for being too hopeful. If this was Janis, though, well he was the Ancient who'd created the puddlejumper that could travel though time, so maybe he had control over the time dilation field.
Fuck, he'd also implied that he'd been checking up on the old Elizabeth they'd found in stasis their first year here …
"I never came back out when Elizabeth was awake," Janis now turned an apologetic frown John"s direction. "I was too afraid she'd blame me or would have wanted to give up since ten thousands years is such a long time, even for stasis. But I was checking in on her, checking out the city and helping where I could."
This time he sounded guilty and like he was looking for absolution.
"I guess I just forgot to reset things that last time. Or you were a little quicker coming to Atlantis this second time through," Janis then laughed.
Like it hadn't been anything. Like Janis hadn't doomed Elizabeth to a life of living Hell, surfacing to a city abandoned and sunk beneath an ocean only three times over ten thousand years trapped in stasis, finally found but too late to survive the ravages even time spent in suspended animation had wrought upon her body.
"So you could have switched out the ZPMs yourself? Instead of convincing Elizabeth to sacrifice her life for our second chance?"
John knew he shouldn't show his anger, that ascended or not, the Ancients could do things with Atlantis he couldn't even imagine - especially one like Janis -- and if he was going to get Francesca out of her, he'd need this guy's cooperation. All he could think of, however, was Elizabeth - both Elizabeth's - who'd given everything they had for the expedition. Who had died deaths that someone like her should never have had to experience. John had only been in stasis for seven hundred years yet he still had nightmares from the experience. While for the most part his mind had been as idle as his body, he'd still had a sense of Atlantis while he'd been waiting, had experienced all of her years as the city faded away under a universe turning red. Sometimes John still felt Atlantis' loneliness and desolation -
"I couldn't go outside for very long without the others sensing me," Janis defended himself. "Without them stopping me."
"But you could have brought her in here with you?" John wasn't ready to give Janis his absolution. "You have a way of counteracting the time differential, able to reappear outside a time of your choosing? So you could have sent Elizabeth out still instead of risking herself, instead of forcing her to feel every moment of her life slipping away while she could do nothing but wait."
"Well, yes, but … she - Although I know she wouldn't have meant to, she wouldn't have been able to help but become a nuisance. Interrupting my work, forcing me to spend time entertaining or placating her. Not that I was actually thinking that when this started, I assure you," Janis defended himself, looking affronted as well as guilty again. "Not consciously at least, but I suppose my subconscious mind could have clouded my reasoning…" He suddenly shook himself.
"No, I can just imagine what would have happened were we both in here together," Janis suddenly grinned. "No doubt we'd have gotten involved and missed one of the switches, dooming everything and everybody. Of course, there isn't any particular clock ticking now --"
"Wait a minute; you've been here for ten thousand years?" Francesca finally found her voice, focusing, thank god, on the initial threat over the potentially more immediate one.
"How is that possible? Who in the Hell are you?"
"My name is Janis, child. I am one of the chief scientists of this wonderful city. I'm -"
"The guy who knows the way out?" Francesca interrupted blithely. "We walked through a fricking wall, but it doesn't work like that here on this side -"
Janis gave them another creepy smile. "Of course, child." He fiddled again with the cube then tilted his head toward their wall.
It looked unchanged to John's eye. But then it had on the other side too, right up until you touched the not wall.
"It's there again, my dear. All set for you to return through with only the same amount of time having passed out there as has passed for you in here. Go ahead without me; I'm not quite ready to face any crowds quite yet …" Janis gestured again with his hand this time, waving them beyond with an expansive flourish like a magician might when performing a trick.
Francesca frowned at that, looking hesitant, as if she was finally picking up on Janis' weird vibe - on what was actually happening in here -- but she moved readily enough when John ushered her steps with a hand to the small of her back. Now close to the wall, John imagined he could sense something that had been missing before. Not that he'd notice anything amiss until its restoration now.
Leading with her own hand, Francesca gave a little laugh when once again it passed through what should have been a solid bulkhead. She then turned and gave Janis a wave before stepping through that Janis stared at bemusedly.
"Oh, John," Janis called out just as John turned to follow her. "It is John, right?" Janis smiled now as if they were friends. "Lieutenant Colonel is just a title? I seem to remember your sweet Elizabeth calling for a Major John Sheppard when we'd first found her. Unless there is a son and a father?" he asked almost coyly.
John nodded warily. "Major and Lieutenant Colonel are two military designations. I was promoted -"
Like a switch suddenly being flipped, the more direct sense of Atlantis that had also returned to the back of John's mind when Janis had opened the portal became uncomfortably muted again. The hand John had never moved too far from his side holster completed the action of pulling and aiming it with little conscious thought. "Okay, that's not going to work for me, Janis," he growled.
John got the disturbing smile in return again. And a long look up and down his body whose meaning was unmistakable.
"You can sense that?" Janis sounded delighted … proud. "You really are one of our children, aren't you? But a weapon, John? You won't kill me. You can't kill me," he mocked gently. "I'm the only one who can send you back. For which you've nothing to worry about," he then added when John narrowed his eye and sighted down the barrel.
"I'm not going to keep you that long," Janis tisked. "And I promise, I will return you to whenever you ask. If you wanted, I could send you back to take Elizabeth's place. So you could save her from me and all of those empty years." He actually laughed saying that.
"No, I suppose not," Janis sobered and looked thoughtful. "What happened to her has already happened for you, and you look like the type that accept regrets as something inevitable and, and … character building, right? Just who would you be without your guilt and your grief, John Sheppard?"
"An arrogant asshole, just like all of your people we've met."
That surprised a more realistic laugh out of Janis. "I suppose it would," he conceded with a tip of his head. "I will try to contain myself then."
"Too late," John muttered to himself, but lowered his gun. Janis was right in that if John did kill him, he'd be killing his best chance to get out of here and back to his own time. He might have thousand of years to find the right combination, but even in here, his survival would still depend on Atlantis' own survival, and he'd already learned how once that hadn't happened when he wasn't there to champion her. Plus, he already had one set of 'what ifs' that felt just as real as if Rodney had lived through them. He wasn't sure he was up for a second set of similar memories.
"What do you want, Janis?" he asked, even though he already suspected.
The look John received this time was the confirmation he didn't want to have. He supposed he should be happy that Janis seemed to have drawn the line at jail bait in letting Francesca go.
Or maybe Janis just didn't like women.
"I see that you understand, John. All that I'm asking for is a few hours of your company. Although," Janis shrugged and turned back toward the wall he'd come through, only to then stop and twist his head to look over his shoulder, complete with the clichéd 'come hither' look. "Although, if you'd agree to give me a few days of your attention, I'd make it worth your while. Without trying to sound too arrogant, I doubt you'd have any new regrets on a personal level, and I'm sure I could also be persuaded to give up a few of Atlantis secrets you would find useful. Maybe one or two of the toys I've spent the last ten years working on?"
"Sorry, Janis, but I don't think I'm going to be prostituting myself for a few gadgets," John raised his gun again.
"Well, isn't that a refreshing thing to hear you say."
John desperately wanted to turn and look behind him, to make sure he wasn't hallucinating or giving into wishful thinking or something. In the next moment, however, he saw another gun move parallel to his, and then felt Rodney's heavy - steady -- hand grasp then slid from his shoulder.
"Sorry it took me so long. But those asshats out there refused to let me follow you through. Not until your little French strumpet came back out. So who's the skeevy Ancient?"
"Janis, if you can believe it."
"Really? And he has some new toys he wants to show you?" The confrontational tone Rodney started out with turned into something more like a squeak. Janis, after all, was the Ancient Rodney's had most admired - or at least would have given up quite a bit for a chance to talk to.
Too fucking bad.
"Hey, if we're lucky, maybe it'll be something like the Attero device," John growled when Rodney's gun dropped below his peripheral view. And Janis was looking amused, and also a little too speculatively in Rodney's direction. "Or maybe another weapon platform like the one on Doranda."
And yes, there was Rodney's gun again, which was probably as close to an apology that John was going to get from Rodney.
"Neither of those experiments were actually mine," Janis said mildly, dismissively. "They didn't work, after all."
"Sure they did," John took a step toward the cube - and Janis. "The Attero device took out seventeen gates at last report, and close to eleven thousand people. Even three or four Wraith cruisers. And made the others really, really pissed off. The weapon platform was much more effective and destroyed an entire fucking solar system - uninhabited, but that was rather more by luck than by design."
Janis raised a brow. "You children have been busy. None of my contemporaries were brave enough to even poke into that work, which is why my assistants brought them to me to assist with. I don't know whether to applaud your initiative, or to be appalled by it."
"Funny, I was just thinking the same thing about you." Rodney's tone had lost all of its hero worship.
"This cube is our way out, Rodney," John gestured toward the table with the hand not keeping the gun aimed. "Think you can figure out how to work it?"
Rodney moved carefully up to John's side again, then beyond him, making sure not to cross in front of John and mess up his shot.
"That won't be necessary, Lieutenant Colonel Sheppard," Janis let his shoulders and head dip. "I may have some interest in … reluctant partners, but I am not a monster. Or a masochist," he smiled faintly. "If you can forgive my lapse of judgment and find it in yourself to trust me, I will send you both back, just seconds after your lovely Francesca."
"What about you?"
"What do you mean?"
John gave him a flat look. "I'm not comfortable about having a crazy uncle puttering around unsupervised in our attic."
Janis arched his brow. "You would be more comfortable with me loose amongst your people?"
"I was thinking more like setting you loose amongst your own. Your friends have all died or Ascended, Atlantis is back on Earth, the Ori and the Asurans have been negated, and the Asguard, the Furlings and the Nox have pretty much abdicated their involvement in the future. Just who are you waiting or working for?"
Finally Janis looked uncomfortable, then lost and even sad. "I …" Only he couldn't come up with that answer. "What am I waiting for?" he repeated sadly to himself.
Several silent moments passed, then Janis looked up and nodded once to them. "Atlantis likes you, Lieutenant Colonel John Sheppard. And she trusts you, Doctor Rodney McKay. I rather think you both care for her in return. All you need do, then, is to touch the cube and decide when you need to return in linear time. Atlantis and the singularity's control interface will handle the rest. If you take the cube with you to the other side, the singularity will collapse and fade out in its own linear time."
"And you?"
"I will do the same. Return to my time, return to my people and face whatever punishments they deem fitting for my tardiness."
"None of that is going to wipe out our timeline though, right?" Rodney's voice was sharp.
Janis shook his head. "I have been outside of time here, Doctor McKay. I did nothing but look in on your sleeping Elizabeth while Atlantis also slumbered, maybe used a little of her precious energy, but I made no repairs, adjustments or additions to be undone. My passing will have no bearing on … anything, really." He sounded surprised. And disappointed. "How extraordinary."
John shifted uncomfortably at Janis" bleakness but Rodney, ever practical and definitely extraordinary Rodney, grabbed the cube, then grabbed John and walked away from what had to be his own personal holy grail without any hesitation.
Atlantis flared. Neither John or Rodney looked back.
-- finis --
Author: Sian1359
For the SGA Flashfic Skeevy Ancients Challenge
Rating: Teen appropriate (language and sexual situations)
Word Count: ~4,200
Genre: Action/Adventure
Spoilers: Anything from all seasons could be in play -- takes place after Enemy At The Gate and SG1: Ark of Truth
Warnings: None
Disclaimer: Stargate Atlantis characters, et al have been borrowed for the duration of the fan effort, with only the deepest love and appreciation behind the intent. No disrespect is intended.
Notes: Title taken from The Rocky Horror Picture Show's Time Warp
Summary: Trouble doesn't end just because the Wraith were thwarted.
When the SGC backed the IOA's refusal to let John (or anyone) fly Atlantis back to the Pegasus Galaxy right away, Rodney was the first to predict dire consequences. To begin with, the longer the city floated just outside San Francisco Bay, the likelier they'd be discovered; the government and Coast Guard could only claim a toxic spill and reroute sea traffic for so long before someone called them on it. Before some adventurer -- or eco-warrior -- tried to sneak out to get exclusive footage on what certain elements were already calling a dodge and a cover-up.
John figured Stargate Command was pushing for full disclosure about the Stargate, intelligent aliens and past staved off invasion attempts while the IOA kept cautioning that the world wasn't ready. Or maybe it was the reverse between them since the US would probably lose a lot of its control over the program once the rest of the world was clued in. Everyone expected a certain amount of chaos after disclosure, but a secret that big … Frankly, that they'd been able to keep the lid on it for this long given all of the apocalypses narrowly averted -- the Wraith just being the latest -- boggled John's mind. If the Powers That Be were caught out without a plan in place, the chaos, accusations and vie for control would only be that much worse.
Closer to home, there was also the fear for Teyla and the few other Athosians who'd elected to stay in Atlantis after they were recovered from Michael's depravations and were now separated from Halling and the rest of their friends and families. Ronon was also stranded of course, and while he'd irrefutably made Atlantis his home after Tyre's death, that didn't mean he'd never change his mind and decide to rejoin the remnants of his people -- or some other civilization back in Pegasus. John didn't see the SGC diverting one of the X-304s from their future tasks in the Milky Way Galaxy just because a few people got homesick -- not if they didn't need to send the Daedalus, the Apollo or the Phoenix to make those forty day resupply trips into Pegasus any longer.
A more immediate and direct concern was, in now being on Earth, the city and the expedition were entirely too accessible to the overseers. For the last two days they'd been entertaining the entire IOA Council, other special guests and assorted family members - not families of the expedition, but of their watchdogs. Including the daughter of France's representative, a precocious fifteen year old with the damn ATA gene, that John and a team of Marines had been saddled with keeping entertained. Currently they were escorting through one of the explored but uninhabited areas of Atlantis so she could make things light up (things that shouldn't blow up in their faces). Francesca DeSalle was running zig-zag along one of the long corridors John and Rodney used to race the RC models, slapping her hands against the walls and the lamps, pretty much ignoring John's suggestion that she slow down. Ignoring his warning that she was going to run into a bulkhead just around the corner if she didn't.
Only the lights then started to chime in the same tones like those which had been the key to unlocking Janis' secret lab a few months back.
Tapping his R/T to contract Rodney, John also picked up his own speed and reached for Francesca's shoulder. Just as Francesca skidded to a stop in front of the bulkhead, the hand she'd flung out disappeared through it. When John started to tug her back, her initial excitement turned into angry French curses loud enough to drown out Rodney's pissy response over interrupting him. Curses then became a scream of fear and pain when Francesca couldn't free her hand. John had just enough time to tell Rodney ‘time dilation field' before he stopped pulling and started pushing.
Mother fucking son of a god damn bitch!
"Ow, shit! What the fuck was that?" Francesca pounded on John as she pulled herself off of him.
He'd more or less managed to cushion her from their fall into the secret room, not sure if the spike of pain through his body was from passing through the field or maybe he'd just banged his elbow. While he couldn't be sure they'd actually gone through a time dilation field, this one had felt different from the barrier outside the last hidden lab that Daniel had found for them - and significantly different than the security fields the Ancient's set up for incarceration areas. It certainly didn't hurt as badly as the known time dilation field back on Teer's planet, but he also hadn't fought against passing through it, so it wasn't like the cells in his body had been out of synch with each other like the last time.
Francesca wasn't doubled over either, though she was trying to shake out and massage her hand. Of course, that could have been because she'd also started banging against the area they'd passed through, which was again a solid bulkhead.
John started looking around for another set of lights or a control panel -
"What did you do, Colonel? Where is the opening?"
"It's a security failsafe," John said confidently, although he felt anything but; no sense in mentioning that there might not be a normal way out. Or how months if not years could have passed outside this room before they found one.
"You-you speak French?" she suddenly squeaked - in English.
He grinned and drew her away from the wall, for once grateful for the private language tutors he and Dave had had to endure while growing up. Embarrassment was easier to deal with than panic.
"I understand it better than I speak it," he stayed speaking French, using a little of the charm that Rodney always rolled his eyes at to try and keep her calm. "I have to say I was pretty impressed at your creativity on the other side of the wall."
Oops, instead of making her feel more comfortable, at his mention of the wall she turned her attention back to it and started pounding on it again.
"Hey, Francesca, don't worry. We've run into this kind of thing before," John worked on reassuring her again. "Rod - Doctor McKay is already on the way. He'll figure it out."
God, John hoped Rodney would. This room could have been a carbon copy of numerous other labs they'd found scattered around the city, with nothing noteworthy about it - certainly nothing to indicate why it was behind a time dilation or security or some other kind of forcefield. John had already turned down ascension twice, and wasn't anymore ready to contemplate it now than he'd been with Chaya or Teer had asked him to join with them. Especially not when he had someone else depending on him. Francesca might be a little rash and rebellious but those traits didn't deserve some kind of death sentence.
He could be wrong about it being a time dilation field anyway. One-way doors had been Scotty Peterson's favorite trick in his high school D&D games (more than one expedition scientist had speculated that E. Gary Gygax had obviously been an Ancient given all of the other elements of the game that had seemed to come to life in Pegasus). Certainly there didn't seem to be any ‘monsters of the id' in here to have to overcome --
"How extraordinary," a man suddenly appeared from behind the wall opposite the one they'd come through. "You're not my people. Are you a hallucination?"
John shifted Francesca behind him but refrained from pulling his sidearm. So far. By the man's dress, he was an Ancient, but walking through walls --
"We're real. Are you?" John wasn't sure why he was so surprised; the last time he'd passed through a time dilation field he'd found a whole colony of people all spending their lives learning how to ascend. If the Ancients had the tech to put together that type of situation on another planet, undoubtedly doing it within Atlantis herself would be a snap. But the thought of one living simultaneously with them over the last five years -- unknown -- was not something John wanted to consider. There was another possibility…
"I don't suppose you're just a hologram? Like the one Morgan pretended to be?
The Ancient shook his head. "You met dear Morgan? As a hologram? She and Myrddin always did have a flare for theatrics, trying to up one another. How, no, when …" he frowned and looked at them again, this time with the same type of expression Rodney's face held when he was puzzled by new Ancient tech. Like he was surprised by not knowing what was before him, given he was the foremost authority.
"This is Francesca DeSalle and I'm Lieutenant Colonel John Sheppard," John managed while his brain (and heart) screamed at him. He'd thrown out Morgan's name, not really expecting a hit, and certainly not with a return like Myrddin. From all he'd read of SG1's reports about their search for the Sangraal and Morgan's subsequent sacrifice to stop the Ori, Morgan and Myrddin had been a couple of heavy hitters back in the days when the Ancients interfered with Earth's development. By the way this Ancient spoke of them, he was a contemporary - or even older.
John was pretty sure this guy was also not Ascended but stuck on the material plane; he'd learned the signs over the years and this one doesn't feel like Chaya. More like Helia, only Atlantis hadn't been traveling at near the speed of light for thousands of years like Helia's ship had been, to keep this one alive in relativistic time. So it was a time dilation field inside this room, one John feared was the reverse of his last one and one so far out of synch with the rest of Atlantis that it was already be too late to return from and find Rodney and the others even alive.
"Oh, you're Elizabeth's people," the man suddenly lit up. "So our little plan and subterfuge did work." Now that he'd identified them in his mind, the Ancient began muttering and seemed to turn inward, continuing to talk to himself while his eyes shifted around the room. "I was sure I reset the alarm after the third switch out, but I suppose -"
The Ancient - Janis -- John was now pretty sure, pushed away from the wall, striding not toward them but instead moving to a table that held a small, innocuous looking box with no discernable features that John had found during his own, albeit brief, search. Janis tinkered with it for a few seconds, still talking to himself, but this time in his own language (or at least one John maybe recognized but couldn't understand). Eventually he had a Rodney type of ah-ha moment and snapped his fingers twice before adjusting something and turning back to face them.
John had kind of his own ah-ha moment, but he wasn't ready to call it such for being too hopeful. If this was Janis, though, well he was the Ancient who'd created the puddlejumper that could travel though time, so maybe he had control over the time dilation field.
Fuck, he'd also implied that he'd been checking up on the old Elizabeth they'd found in stasis their first year here …
"I never came back out when Elizabeth was awake," Janis now turned an apologetic frown John"s direction. "I was too afraid she'd blame me or would have wanted to give up since ten thousands years is such a long time, even for stasis. But I was checking in on her, checking out the city and helping where I could."
This time he sounded guilty and like he was looking for absolution.
"I guess I just forgot to reset things that last time. Or you were a little quicker coming to Atlantis this second time through," Janis then laughed.
Like it hadn't been anything. Like Janis hadn't doomed Elizabeth to a life of living Hell, surfacing to a city abandoned and sunk beneath an ocean only three times over ten thousand years trapped in stasis, finally found but too late to survive the ravages even time spent in suspended animation had wrought upon her body.
"So you could have switched out the ZPMs yourself? Instead of convincing Elizabeth to sacrifice her life for our second chance?"
John knew he shouldn't show his anger, that ascended or not, the Ancients could do things with Atlantis he couldn't even imagine - especially one like Janis -- and if he was going to get Francesca out of her, he'd need this guy's cooperation. All he could think of, however, was Elizabeth - both Elizabeth's - who'd given everything they had for the expedition. Who had died deaths that someone like her should never have had to experience. John had only been in stasis for seven hundred years yet he still had nightmares from the experience. While for the most part his mind had been as idle as his body, he'd still had a sense of Atlantis while he'd been waiting, had experienced all of her years as the city faded away under a universe turning red. Sometimes John still felt Atlantis' loneliness and desolation -
"I couldn't go outside for very long without the others sensing me," Janis defended himself. "Without them stopping me."
"But you could have brought her in here with you?" John wasn't ready to give Janis his absolution. "You have a way of counteracting the time differential, able to reappear outside a time of your choosing? So you could have sent Elizabeth out still instead of risking herself, instead of forcing her to feel every moment of her life slipping away while she could do nothing but wait."
"Well, yes, but … she - Although I know she wouldn't have meant to, she wouldn't have been able to help but become a nuisance. Interrupting my work, forcing me to spend time entertaining or placating her. Not that I was actually thinking that when this started, I assure you," Janis defended himself, looking affronted as well as guilty again. "Not consciously at least, but I suppose my subconscious mind could have clouded my reasoning…" He suddenly shook himself.
"No, I can just imagine what would have happened were we both in here together," Janis suddenly grinned. "No doubt we'd have gotten involved and missed one of the switches, dooming everything and everybody. Of course, there isn't any particular clock ticking now --"
"Wait a minute; you've been here for ten thousand years?" Francesca finally found her voice, focusing, thank god, on the initial threat over the potentially more immediate one.
"How is that possible? Who in the Hell are you?"
"My name is Janis, child. I am one of the chief scientists of this wonderful city. I'm -"
"The guy who knows the way out?" Francesca interrupted blithely. "We walked through a fricking wall, but it doesn't work like that here on this side -"
Janis gave them another creepy smile. "Of course, child." He fiddled again with the cube then tilted his head toward their wall.
It looked unchanged to John's eye. But then it had on the other side too, right up until you touched the not wall.
"It's there again, my dear. All set for you to return through with only the same amount of time having passed out there as has passed for you in here. Go ahead without me; I'm not quite ready to face any crowds quite yet …" Janis gestured again with his hand this time, waving them beyond with an expansive flourish like a magician might when performing a trick.
Francesca frowned at that, looking hesitant, as if she was finally picking up on Janis' weird vibe - on what was actually happening in here -- but she moved readily enough when John ushered her steps with a hand to the small of her back. Now close to the wall, John imagined he could sense something that had been missing before. Not that he'd notice anything amiss until its restoration now.
Leading with her own hand, Francesca gave a little laugh when once again it passed through what should have been a solid bulkhead. She then turned and gave Janis a wave before stepping through that Janis stared at bemusedly.
"Oh, John," Janis called out just as John turned to follow her. "It is John, right?" Janis smiled now as if they were friends. "Lieutenant Colonel is just a title? I seem to remember your sweet Elizabeth calling for a Major John Sheppard when we'd first found her. Unless there is a son and a father?" he asked almost coyly.
John nodded warily. "Major and Lieutenant Colonel are two military designations. I was promoted -"
Like a switch suddenly being flipped, the more direct sense of Atlantis that had also returned to the back of John's mind when Janis had opened the portal became uncomfortably muted again. The hand John had never moved too far from his side holster completed the action of pulling and aiming it with little conscious thought. "Okay, that's not going to work for me, Janis," he growled.
John got the disturbing smile in return again. And a long look up and down his body whose meaning was unmistakable.
"You can sense that?" Janis sounded delighted … proud. "You really are one of our children, aren't you? But a weapon, John? You won't kill me. You can't kill me," he mocked gently. "I'm the only one who can send you back. For which you've nothing to worry about," he then added when John narrowed his eye and sighted down the barrel.
"I'm not going to keep you that long," Janis tisked. "And I promise, I will return you to whenever you ask. If you wanted, I could send you back to take Elizabeth's place. So you could save her from me and all of those empty years." He actually laughed saying that.
"No, I suppose not," Janis sobered and looked thoughtful. "What happened to her has already happened for you, and you look like the type that accept regrets as something inevitable and, and … character building, right? Just who would you be without your guilt and your grief, John Sheppard?"
"An arrogant asshole, just like all of your people we've met."
That surprised a more realistic laugh out of Janis. "I suppose it would," he conceded with a tip of his head. "I will try to contain myself then."
"Too late," John muttered to himself, but lowered his gun. Janis was right in that if John did kill him, he'd be killing his best chance to get out of here and back to his own time. He might have thousand of years to find the right combination, but even in here, his survival would still depend on Atlantis' own survival, and he'd already learned how once that hadn't happened when he wasn't there to champion her. Plus, he already had one set of 'what ifs' that felt just as real as if Rodney had lived through them. He wasn't sure he was up for a second set of similar memories.
"What do you want, Janis?" he asked, even though he already suspected.
The look John received this time was the confirmation he didn't want to have. He supposed he should be happy that Janis seemed to have drawn the line at jail bait in letting Francesca go.
Or maybe Janis just didn't like women.
"I see that you understand, John. All that I'm asking for is a few hours of your company. Although," Janis shrugged and turned back toward the wall he'd come through, only to then stop and twist his head to look over his shoulder, complete with the clichéd 'come hither' look. "Although, if you'd agree to give me a few days of your attention, I'd make it worth your while. Without trying to sound too arrogant, I doubt you'd have any new regrets on a personal level, and I'm sure I could also be persuaded to give up a few of Atlantis secrets you would find useful. Maybe one or two of the toys I've spent the last ten years working on?"
"Sorry, Janis, but I don't think I'm going to be prostituting myself for a few gadgets," John raised his gun again.
"Well, isn't that a refreshing thing to hear you say."
John desperately wanted to turn and look behind him, to make sure he wasn't hallucinating or giving into wishful thinking or something. In the next moment, however, he saw another gun move parallel to his, and then felt Rodney's heavy - steady -- hand grasp then slid from his shoulder.
"Sorry it took me so long. But those asshats out there refused to let me follow you through. Not until your little French strumpet came back out. So who's the skeevy Ancient?"
"Janis, if you can believe it."
"Really? And he has some new toys he wants to show you?" The confrontational tone Rodney started out with turned into something more like a squeak. Janis, after all, was the Ancient Rodney's had most admired - or at least would have given up quite a bit for a chance to talk to.
Too fucking bad.
"Hey, if we're lucky, maybe it'll be something like the Attero device," John growled when Rodney's gun dropped below his peripheral view. And Janis was looking amused, and also a little too speculatively in Rodney's direction. "Or maybe another weapon platform like the one on Doranda."
And yes, there was Rodney's gun again, which was probably as close to an apology that John was going to get from Rodney.
"Neither of those experiments were actually mine," Janis said mildly, dismissively. "They didn't work, after all."
"Sure they did," John took a step toward the cube - and Janis. "The Attero device took out seventeen gates at last report, and close to eleven thousand people. Even three or four Wraith cruisers. And made the others really, really pissed off. The weapon platform was much more effective and destroyed an entire fucking solar system - uninhabited, but that was rather more by luck than by design."
Janis raised a brow. "You children have been busy. None of my contemporaries were brave enough to even poke into that work, which is why my assistants brought them to me to assist with. I don't know whether to applaud your initiative, or to be appalled by it."
"Funny, I was just thinking the same thing about you." Rodney's tone had lost all of its hero worship.
"This cube is our way out, Rodney," John gestured toward the table with the hand not keeping the gun aimed. "Think you can figure out how to work it?"
Rodney moved carefully up to John's side again, then beyond him, making sure not to cross in front of John and mess up his shot.
"That won't be necessary, Lieutenant Colonel Sheppard," Janis let his shoulders and head dip. "I may have some interest in … reluctant partners, but I am not a monster. Or a masochist," he smiled faintly. "If you can forgive my lapse of judgment and find it in yourself to trust me, I will send you both back, just seconds after your lovely Francesca."
"What about you?"
"What do you mean?"
John gave him a flat look. "I'm not comfortable about having a crazy uncle puttering around unsupervised in our attic."
Janis arched his brow. "You would be more comfortable with me loose amongst your people?"
"I was thinking more like setting you loose amongst your own. Your friends have all died or Ascended, Atlantis is back on Earth, the Ori and the Asurans have been negated, and the Asguard, the Furlings and the Nox have pretty much abdicated their involvement in the future. Just who are you waiting or working for?"
Finally Janis looked uncomfortable, then lost and even sad. "I …" Only he couldn't come up with that answer. "What am I waiting for?" he repeated sadly to himself.
Several silent moments passed, then Janis looked up and nodded once to them. "Atlantis likes you, Lieutenant Colonel John Sheppard. And she trusts you, Doctor Rodney McKay. I rather think you both care for her in return. All you need do, then, is to touch the cube and decide when you need to return in linear time. Atlantis and the singularity's control interface will handle the rest. If you take the cube with you to the other side, the singularity will collapse and fade out in its own linear time."
"And you?"
"I will do the same. Return to my time, return to my people and face whatever punishments they deem fitting for my tardiness."
"None of that is going to wipe out our timeline though, right?" Rodney's voice was sharp.
Janis shook his head. "I have been outside of time here, Doctor McKay. I did nothing but look in on your sleeping Elizabeth while Atlantis also slumbered, maybe used a little of her precious energy, but I made no repairs, adjustments or additions to be undone. My passing will have no bearing on … anything, really." He sounded surprised. And disappointed. "How extraordinary."
John shifted uncomfortably at Janis" bleakness but Rodney, ever practical and definitely extraordinary Rodney, grabbed the cube, then grabbed John and walked away from what had to be his own personal holy grail without any hesitation.
Atlantis flared. Neither John or Rodney looked back.
-- finis --