Preview: Restoration, by the_scary_kitty
Title: Restoration
Author: the_scary_kitty
Pairings: John/Elizabeth, with side orders of Teyla/Kanaan and Rodney/Jennifer
Rating: R for language, violence (including torture) and assorted mayhem (Preview: PG-13)
Word Count: 60,290
Beta Readers:
anuna_81 and southernred2
Spoilers: For "Enemy at the Gate," as well as the Fandemonium novels "Reliquary" by Martha Wells, and "Angelus" by Peter J. Evans.
Summary: AU/The Season 6 That Should Have Been. Atlantis's return to the Pegasus Galaxy is marked by new discoveries and adventures, continuing conflicts stressed to the breaking point, the return of old friends and foes alike, and more than one miracle that no one expected.
****
Five years later
Atlantis
“Papa, tell us a story!” Torren looked up at his parents with a hopeful smile.
“Story, story!” Little Charin, only three years old, clapped her hands gleefully.
Kanaan and Teyla exchanged indulgent smiles. Stories at bedtime were, it seemed, a universal ritual from Athos to Earth. “What story would you like to hear tonight?” Kanaan asked their children. Torren’s face wrinkled as he thought, but Charin had her own idea right away.
“Unka John and Aunt Lizabet!”
“Yeah!” Torren cheered.
Teyla smiled. Looking back on that series of adventures, it all seemed very much like a fairy tale, as her friends from Earth called such fantastic stories. “Yes, that is a good story.” She took a deep breath. “In the time since the people Athos first met the people of Earth, who had found the city of the Ancestors, we have embarked on a journey none of us could ever have imagined. We have discovered wonders the likes of which have not been seen in ages…”
At last, they came to the end of the tunnel, which opened up into an enormous cavern that made the cave containing the Stargate seem like little more than a closet in comparison. Sprawling across the floor of the cavern was a vast metropolis of stone buildings in a dizzying variety of shapes and sizes that seemed to follow no particular design motif. Some buildings curved in rippling waves, while others looked like a jumble of tinker toys randomly stuck together in a way that made no sense whatsoever. Massive stone bridges swooped over reflecting pools, then dove under each other in what seemed like a wild parody of a freeway interchange in any modern city on Earth. More of those strange phosphorescent stones were studded into the ceiling of the chamber high above them, giving off enough light to see everything without needing their flashlights. The whole city wore an air of extreme neglect, the damage done by the Wraith bombs and the further deterioration since never repaired, yet the decay held its own kind of beauty. Sheppard found himself thinking, not for the first time, and he was certain not for the last, that Elizabeth would have loved to have seen this place.
“We have suffered many joys and many losses…”
All of a sudden, McKay yelped as a cloaked figure jumped down from the trees above. Everyone pulled their guns on the figure, who held out its hands, one of which was holding a rather large bow; a quiver of arrows was slung across its back. Clearly, this was their mysterious benefactor.
“Nice shooting, Robin Hood,” Sheppard drawled appreciatively.
The figure nodded, and slowly, so as not to alarm them, raised its other hand to push back the deep hood concealing its face to reveal-a grinning Aiden Ford.
“But our greatest loss, and our greatest joy, was the one we call the Avatar of Atlantis, Elizabeth Weir. When the Asurans took her from us, they took not only a leader and a dear friend, they stole our hearts with her. Yet when we finally found where she had been hidden from us, we discovered that they had stolen much more from her…”
They stepped around the last console and into an open space right in front of the tank, which allowed them to get their first unobstructed look at the massive machine and what was inside.
Or rather, who was inside.
Her nude body floated in a greenish-blue fluid that couldn't possibly be water, arms dangling limply at her side. Dark hair that appeared to be longer than the last time they’d seen her drifted in a halo around her head and shoulders. A web of thin tubes and wires appeared to have been inserted directly into her body-her arms and legs, in a row down her spine, into her head-all of it connecting her to the machines outside the stasis chamber. Her eyes were closed and she appeared to be asleep. None of them wanted to consider the only possible alternative.
It was Elizabeth Weir.
They realized then that the repeating tone that had been quietly sounding in the background was her heartbeat.
“So what happened next?” Torren asked.
“Like all stories, this one is not yet finished,” Kanaan told Torren and Charin. “Life is a great adventure, and theirs has only just begun.”
Author: the_scary_kitty
Pairings: John/Elizabeth, with side orders of Teyla/Kanaan and Rodney/Jennifer
Rating: R for language, violence (including torture) and assorted mayhem (Preview: PG-13)
Word Count: 60,290
Beta Readers:
anuna_81 and southernred2
Spoilers: For "Enemy at the Gate," as well as the Fandemonium novels "Reliquary" by Martha Wells, and "Angelus" by Peter J. Evans.
Summary: AU/The Season 6 That Should Have Been. Atlantis's return to the Pegasus Galaxy is marked by new discoveries and adventures, continuing conflicts stressed to the breaking point, the return of old friends and foes alike, and more than one miracle that no one expected.
****
Five years later
Atlantis
“Papa, tell us a story!” Torren looked up at his parents with a hopeful smile.
“Story, story!” Little Charin, only three years old, clapped her hands gleefully.
Kanaan and Teyla exchanged indulgent smiles. Stories at bedtime were, it seemed, a universal ritual from Athos to Earth. “What story would you like to hear tonight?” Kanaan asked their children. Torren’s face wrinkled as he thought, but Charin had her own idea right away.
“Unka John and Aunt Lizabet!”
“Yeah!” Torren cheered.
Teyla smiled. Looking back on that series of adventures, it all seemed very much like a fairy tale, as her friends from Earth called such fantastic stories. “Yes, that is a good story.” She took a deep breath. “In the time since the people Athos first met the people of Earth, who had found the city of the Ancestors, we have embarked on a journey none of us could ever have imagined. We have discovered wonders the likes of which have not been seen in ages…”
At last, they came to the end of the tunnel, which opened up into an enormous cavern that made the cave containing the Stargate seem like little more than a closet in comparison. Sprawling across the floor of the cavern was a vast metropolis of stone buildings in a dizzying variety of shapes and sizes that seemed to follow no particular design motif. Some buildings curved in rippling waves, while others looked like a jumble of tinker toys randomly stuck together in a way that made no sense whatsoever. Massive stone bridges swooped over reflecting pools, then dove under each other in what seemed like a wild parody of a freeway interchange in any modern city on Earth. More of those strange phosphorescent stones were studded into the ceiling of the chamber high above them, giving off enough light to see everything without needing their flashlights. The whole city wore an air of extreme neglect, the damage done by the Wraith bombs and the further deterioration since never repaired, yet the decay held its own kind of beauty. Sheppard found himself thinking, not for the first time, and he was certain not for the last, that Elizabeth would have loved to have seen this place.
“We have suffered many joys and many losses…”
All of a sudden, McKay yelped as a cloaked figure jumped down from the trees above. Everyone pulled their guns on the figure, who held out its hands, one of which was holding a rather large bow; a quiver of arrows was slung across its back. Clearly, this was their mysterious benefactor.
“Nice shooting, Robin Hood,” Sheppard drawled appreciatively.
The figure nodded, and slowly, so as not to alarm them, raised its other hand to push back the deep hood concealing its face to reveal-a grinning Aiden Ford.
“But our greatest loss, and our greatest joy, was the one we call the Avatar of Atlantis, Elizabeth Weir. When the Asurans took her from us, they took not only a leader and a dear friend, they stole our hearts with her. Yet when we finally found where she had been hidden from us, we discovered that they had stolen much more from her…”
They stepped around the last console and into an open space right in front of the tank, which allowed them to get their first unobstructed look at the massive machine and what was inside.
Or rather, who was inside.
Her nude body floated in a greenish-blue fluid that couldn't possibly be water, arms dangling limply at her side. Dark hair that appeared to be longer than the last time they’d seen her drifted in a halo around her head and shoulders. A web of thin tubes and wires appeared to have been inserted directly into her body-her arms and legs, in a row down her spine, into her head-all of it connecting her to the machines outside the stasis chamber. Her eyes were closed and she appeared to be asleep. None of them wanted to consider the only possible alternative.
It was Elizabeth Weir.
They realized then that the repeating tone that had been quietly sounding in the background was her heartbeat.
“So what happened next?” Torren asked.
“Like all stories, this one is not yet finished,” Kanaan told Torren and Charin. “Life is a great adventure, and theirs has only just begun.”