Reconquista (3/5)

[coolbreeze1]

Part 3

John blinked, feeling like his eyes had been opened for a while and yet he'd just woken up. He heard a rumble of voices around, but it took another long moment for him to realize he was still a captive, still at the center of a trial with no clue how his defense was going.

"Not 'Lantis," he mumbled. Something had convinced his half-asleep brain that he was actually in Atlantis. The floaty feeling of drugs in his blood, maybe. Or the lack of feeling just beneath the surface of his skin.

"No, I'm afraid not, lad," Carson whispered.

Or that. John gave a half grin, smelling the doctor's soap and cologne. It wasn't something he'd probably consciously noticed before, but the lack of pain and Carson's presence were usually telltale signs that he was on the good stuff in the infirmary.

This time, however, he was still chained to his cage, his broken arm still tied to the bench, and a band still wrapped around his torso and fastened behind him. His left arm was sporting an IV, and an oxygen mask still sat on his face.

"What’s… going on?" he whispered through the mask.

Carson leaned forward bringing his mouth as close to John's ear as he could through the bars. "Ronon and Halling were able to convince the judges that I have a right to be here to testify on your behalf concerning the Hoffan plague and Michael. When they saw how ill you were, the judges finally allowed me to treat you."

“Finally?”

"Aye. There was quite an argument, mostly between the lead judge in the center seat-"

"Slick."

"Excuse me?"

John nodded vaguely toward the judges. "Calling him Slick… in my head."

"As good a name as any. He and the dark-haired woman at the end refused vehemently at first. They didn't want anyone near you, said we would pull some trick. Some of the other judges disagreed, and they all adjourned to another room, presumably to talk it over. When they came back, they said I could treat you as long as I did not attempt to get you out of this damned cage."

"Had the IV before, right?"

"Aye, you did. I managed to start you on fluids and get a mask on you before the judges could say otherwise."

The prosecutor to his right moved to the front of the room, waving his arms as he spoke. A wave of dizziness rushed over John, and he blinked at the sudden sensation of a sitting on a boat in a storm. The prosecutor's voice wavered in an out, another man throwing in an incoherent string of words during the pauses. It took several minutes for John to figure out that the prosecutor was questioning someone. He inched his head to the side and saw the bomb doctor's face blur, sharpen, then blur again.

"Tell me what you're feeling, " Carson whispered. "They said you grew sick quickly, soon after arriving here, but they don't know what's wrong."

John chuckled, a breathless huff of desperation muted by the plastic oxygen mask. "Not sick. They know…" he ground out. "He did it."

"Who?"

"The man… talking… doctor…"

Sound was roaring in and out, like he was standing in a wind tunnel. He felt the ground solid beneath his feet, the bench hard and flat beneath his butt, the bars digging into his back. He wasn't moving, but his stomach twisted and turned like he was, and he flashed to his dream of the roller coaster.

"He's from Hoff," Carson murmured. He shifted, leaning around the side of the cage toward the judges and witness stand.

John looked over and even through the froth of lightheadedness threatening to drown him, he saw the pain in his friend's eyes. Carson was pale, the muscles in his face rigid with stress. A court might be able to argue that this Carson had only existed for the last couple of years, but there was little difference between the clone and the real man. The pain in Carson's face as he relived the events of Hoff was evidence enough of that.

John scanned the faces of the judges, most of them reflecting a collective look of horror. He didn't need to hear what the prosecutor and witness were saying. The judges' expressions said enough. Except for Slick. His face was stony, and John sensed rather than saw that he was battling to keep as much emotion off his expression as possible. At the end of the dais, Shiana was glaring at him, open hatred on her expression. She narrowed her eyes at John's look and pointed to the detonator.

He swallowed, looking away. Carson was holding John's wrist, pressing into the pulse point. He leaned forward again, turning his head away from the judges so he could whisper directly into John's ear. "What did he do?"

"Bomb," John whispered. Would Shiana detonate the explosive if he told Carson about it? Or was that why they'd allowed the doctor into the cage-for John to tell them of the consequences for making any kind of escape? What good was a deterrence if no one knew about it? He was getting the impression that they hadn’t really thought through this whole bomb idea, and he didn’t know if that was good news or bad news for him. Probably bad news.

"You said that before. What do you mean, bomb?"

"Bomb," he repeated, feeling his heart rate tick up. He breathed deeply, feeling Carson's grip tighten on his wrist. Carefully, he moved his free hand up to his stomach, directly over the incision and bandage. "They cut… me…"

Carson stared at him, confused, but before he could say anything, noise erupted in the courtroom for the midday break. The Amish doctor and prosecutor were huddled near the table. Guards had closed in around them in the cage, keeping Ronon and anyone else away. The judges stood up and began filing out of the room, but Shiana made her way to the cage. She leaned forward, pressing her face through the bars.

"Go ahead, Sheppard," she hissed, just loud enough for him and Carson to hear. "If it was up to me, I'd let everyone learn the hard way why they can't take you from this mountain. But tell him what we've done to keep you here, if you wish." She shot a glance at Slick, who was talking to one of the guards near the dais. "He seems to think letting your people know will keep them honest."

She spun on her heel, her hair snapping around to the side before either John or Carson could respond. John breathed deep, watching her disappear through a side door with Slick and the last of the other judges.

"What did she mean? John, what bomb? What are you talking about?"

"The doctor," John whispered, his stomach cramping as he spoke. "Put a… bomb… in me." He flinched suddenly, realizing how much danger Carson was in just being near him. He twisted his arm out of the doctor's grasp. "Get away… you have… too dangerous…"

Carson's eyebrows had climbed, his face losing all color. He shook off John's grip easily and reached out, tentatively placing a hand over the bandage. The touch was light and gentle, but John recoiled anyway, moaning at the ripple of pain that shot out from the incision site.

"Dear Lord," Carson breathed. "You don't mean to say…"

"Bomb," John panted. "Please… too dangerous… bomb…"

"Inside you? As in, surgically implanted?"

"That doctor… cut… have to get away... Doc, leave me…" John lurched forward, straining against the band around his chest. The abrupt movement ignited the nerves along the surgical site, sending lancing pain through his chest and gut. He cried out, breathless despite the oxygen mask feeding him air. Shouts around him grew louder, and then a knife blade of pain stabbing him in the arm washed everything out.

When he woke up the second time, sound returned first. Carson was yelling at the Amish doctor, one hand on John's shoulder. John's head was hanging forward, chin on chest and a line of drool running down his chin. He willed his eyes to open, but they were glued fast, and the effort he exerted to pry them apart made his head swim.

He must have moaned. Carson's yelling cut off abruptly. Hands eased his head back, pressed into his neck, tugged at the needle in his arm. Distantly, John heard footsteps stomp away and a door slam, then a murmur of voices broke out amongst those in the audience watching the whole scene.

"Doc!" Ronon yelled out. John heard him move close.

Carson was pressing John’s forehead back, holding it steady until it was resting in the space between the bars at his back. He groaned at the sensation of water sloshing back and forth inside his cranium and squeezed his eyes closed.

"John? Are you awake? Open your eyes for me."

A moment later, fingers pried his lids open anyway, flashing a light in his face and making him flinch. Too bright. Too fast. He licked his lips, feeling the hiss of air from the mask and the muted pinch of the IV in the crook of his arm. When something pressed into his ear, he finally managed to blink open his eyes, and half of Carson's face blurred above him.

The thermometer in his ear beeped, and Carson scowled at the readout, his expression a mixture of rage and alarm.

"How bad is it?"

Carson was standing on a chair, bending over the top of the cage. John watched him look at Ronon then back to John, his eyes raking over the front of his shirt. He squatted down, then tentatively reached out through the bars, brushing his fingers against the bandage just below John's breastbone. John heard him audibly gulp and imagined his Adam's apple bobbing.

"It's true. God above." Carson dropped from the chair so fast, that Ronon jerked a hand out to grab him. The two of them were on the side of the cage, barely within John’s peripheral vision. Carson rubbed a hand over his face, turning even paler.

"Beckett?" Ronon pressed, moving closer to John and resting a hand on his shoulder.

"Bomb," John whispered, though he was sure his voice was lost under the oxygen mask.

Ronon's hand tightened on his shoulder. "What?"

"Bomb," Carson answered. "Of all the barbaric things I've seen, this…" he shook his head. "The woman who sits at the end of the dais, she told us to tell you and anyone who might be thinking of staging a rescue that they put a… a damned bomb inside him. I can feel bandages across his upper abdomen…"

His voice trailed off as he looked at John for confirmation. John nodded, feeling a giddy sense of relief that they knew about it. Like he wasn't carrying the weight of it all on his own. The room tilted, blurring to a bright white for a moment before fading back almost into focus.

"Are you in pain, lad? Of course, you're in pain. What the hell kind of question is that? Dear Lord…"

And yet he wasn't in pain. He twisted slightly, tensing his abs. He felt a slight tug where the bandages were, but little more. His right arm was completely numb, and the rest of his body felt like it was shivering under a thick layer of cement. Even the hard bench and bars felt squishy, like he was a kid hopping on a bouncy ball.

"Do'ssnn…hurrr'…" he slurred. He let his eyes slide closed. No pain. No fever. No hot. No cold. The dark was nice. Drugs, he knew, but they were nice, too.

"I have no idea what they've injected him with," Carson said, standing to hover over him. "We need to get him home."

"The woman who talked to you, she's been holding a little gray box with a purple light. Playing with it through the whole trial."

"Det…deh…det…" John stopped shaking his head when the word wouldn't form in his mouth. Detonator. "Det…nate…det…No. Dddd…" He groaned in frustration. Where was the dark? The quiet? That's what he needed. He just needed to lie down for a little bit. His body sank deeper against the bars.

"Detonator?" Carson asked.

That was the word he was trying to say. He nodded, but kept his eyes closed. The numbness was still coating him, containing jittery nerves, heart, and lungs. When the drugs wore off, everything would snap out of place, exploding-

Explode.

He jerked his head up, the image of his insides spraying out of a bomb blast in his gut slowly fading. Carson was behind him again, and he grabbed John's arm through the cage to steady him. The judges were back, the audience quiet. He must have passed out again. He felt his heart beat faster. The drugs were still there, flowing through his system and dulling his nerve, and beads of light hung in the air around him, humming like bees without moving.

He lifted his head from the bars and looked at Ronon, fighting through the drug hallucinations and heavy lethargy. He couldn't zone out, no matter how much it hurt. He had to pay attention, focus. The bomb wasn't just a threat to him now-it was a threat to Ronon and Carson and Halling and…

"Teyla?" he mumbled.

Carson started and turned to glance at John. "Not here," he whispered. "She's out recruiting witnesses again."

"Wi'nnessess?"

"Aye, for your defense. Not everyone in this galaxy thinks you're guilty."

"Howwwmmmdoingg?"

"Hard to tell, but so far, I'd say Ronon's putting up a solid defense for ya."

Ronon had stopped talking, though John had no clue what he'd been saying. He needed to pay closer attention. He blinked his eyes, forcing the courtroom and the people in it to come into focus.

"This should be interesting," Carson murmured.

"Wha’?"

"Hang on, John. I'll be back here in a minute."

With that, he stood and made his way to the witness chair in front of the judges. He sat, taking a deep breath. The cinders of pain in John’s stomach were threatening to wake up, and he breathed carefully. Resting against the bars, he could watch Ronon and Carson without moving at all.

Ronon stood in front of the judges. "The prosecution argued that Hoff was wiped out because of our interference, and when the Hoffan plague spread to other worlds because of their drug, the people who survived were then hunted by the Wraith-all because of what we did. Unlike the first charge of waking the Wraith, they said we acted consciously in this situation, that we weren't acting in self-defense this time. It wasn't a choice between Sheppard's life or a Wraith's life. It was proactive-on purpose."

He sounded like a lawyer, confident and in control. For a brief second, John caught a glimpse of who Ronon might have been if the Wraith had not destroyed Sateda, but he shook it off, cursing the drugs muddling his brain. A headache was beginning to pound in his temples but he forced himself to focus on what was being said.

"That's not the whole story," Ronon said. Over the next few minutes, he guided Carson through a few easy questions. Carson must have known what he was going to ask him. He answered quickly with no hesitation.

John's heart twisted in sympathy and a pain wholly unrelated to his present injuries as he remembered their time on Hoff. Carson spent a lot of time talking about his burgeoning relationship with the Hoffan doctor, Perna, the excitement and pure thrill of discovery as they’d chased down scientific question after scientific question. The hope that the Hoffan drug had offered them back then was born again in that morning’s trial. Behind him, the court audience mimicked Carson's emotions. John heard gasps at the idea of a being immune to Wraith feedings, utter stillness at the sacrifice and dedication of so many generations of Hoffan trying to reach for success, tears from a few when the ill man had sacrificed himself, and claps by many more when he’d lived through the feeding.

The ill man had later died. Then the Wraith. Beckett made it clear that the Hoffan drug had passed from a possible defense to decidedly offensive in nature.

Ronon had gradually stepped back to let Carson have center stage. He held a few papers in his hands, and John thought he saw them shake a little before Ronon set them back on the table again. Carson nodded, giving him a small smile.

“What did Sheppard do after we figured out the drug killed the Wraith?”

“He asked me to stop working until he’d had a chance to talk to the Chancellor. We all knew that the fact that the drug did not just stop the Wraith from feeding but killed them changed everything. It became a weapon, a very dangerous weapon, and we had no doubt what the Wraith would do once they learned of it.”

“And what happened when he talked to the Chancellor?”

Carson scowled. “Colonel Sheppard urged him to stop. The Hoffans had been pursuing this idea relentlessly for generations, and they were moving too quickly. They weren’t thinking about the implications of what having this drug and using this drug would mean to the Wraith.”

“But they continued?”

“Continued? Aye, you could say that. They refused to stop. The drug had proven successful in preventing one feeding, and the momentum to push it further and further was like a crashing wave. They were blinded by the momentary success and started inoculating their entire population. You just don’t do that sort of thing after one test. Medicine is not-”

“Beckett,” Ronon called out, interrupting him before he veered into a full-blown rant.

Carson snapped his jaw shut, a touch of color reddening his cheeks. “Sorry,” he mumbled.

The drugs in John's system were fading fast. He felt a bead of sweat run down the side of his face. The vise around his head shifted, clamping down on the muscles in his neck and back. The cage and bench grew solid and hard, digging into his body. He blinked, biting back a groan. He had to hold out long enough for Ronon to make his point. Then maybe the court day would be over and he could lie down for a little while.

“Despite our warnings about how the Wraith were likely to react," Carson said, "they began spreading the drug to all of their people. They had a whole schedule almost immediately, with the labs working nonstop to produce the serum. As soon as it was done, they would send it to the hospitals where it was administered almost before the boxes hit the floor. I’ve never seen anything like it. Colonel Sheppard and I returned to talk to the Chancellor again, begging him to slow down and act a little more cautiously, when…”

“When?” Ronon prompted.

“We got an emergency call from the central hospital in the city. People had started pouring in with some unknown acute respiratory illness, overwhelming their resources. I went to work, trying to help where I could while Colonel Sheppard sent word back to Atlantis, calling for a full emergency medical support team. We figured out quickly that the illness was connected to the Hoffan serum-half of all people inoculated died. There was nothing we could do. Perna-”

Carson stopped, his voice breaking as he choked back the emotion. “So many people died. If only they’d listened to us. If we could have tested the drug a little more, maybe…”

“What did the Hoffan government do when it learned of the death rate?” Ronon asked, pushing Carson's testimony forward.

The doctor shook himself, taking a deep breath. “They held a vote amongst all of their people to decide whether or not they should continue inoculating their people with the drug.”

“Did you see the results?”

“Aye, we did. As we were leaving. We’d helped the Hoffans at their request, but we could no longer in good conscience continue to help them administer such a lethal drug. The vote was 96 percent in favor of continuing.”

“Why didn't anyone from Atlantis try to stop them?”

“Stop them?” Carson repeated. “It wasn’t our place or our right to do so. We helped them when they asked for help, but they crossed a line that we, ethically, could not cross with them. We didn’t agree with their actions, but their people had voted on it. It was their decision to move forward with the drug inoculation, not ours. So we left.”

“What happened to them after you left?”

John's heart twisted again and he closed his eyes. Memories of the destroyed world rose in his mind, forever replacing the ones of the thriving world he'd seen when they'd first arrived.

Carson slumped back in his chair. “They were destroyed by the Wraith, just like we knew they would be. About five or six months later, we learned that the Wraith had become active in that part of the galaxy. We sent a MALP-a camera-to find out if the Hoffans were still alive. The main city around the gate had been destroyed. They were gone, at least as far as we could tell-either killed or escaped.”

“Okay,” Ronon said. “Thanks. That’s all.”Carson stood and headed straight for the cage. He dropped down in his seat directly behind John, immediately grabbing John’s wrist and feeling for a pulse.

"Did good," John whispered.

"That was just the set up," Carson answered. Ronon was back at his table, leaning over his notes and asking for the bomb doctor-Jobin Cresha-to come forward as a witness. The judges looked at each other in confusion, but eventually shrugged, and Slick waved a hand over his head.

Out of the corner of his eye, John saw the Amish lookalike breeze past him, his face devoid of expression as Ronon waited for him to sit down. He looked older to John than he had earlier that day, but the evaporating drugs were giving everything a harder edge.

The old doctor sat stiffly in the chair. “I’ve given my testimony of what happened already. What else could you possibly need to know?”

“Where did you work?” Ronon’s voice came out sharp and loud, cutting the doctor off.

The other man bared his teeth, anger flooding into his expression. “I am a medical doctor,” he said, each word clearly enunciated and carried to every corner of the room. “I worked at the hospital.”

“In the capital city.”

“Yes.”

“That’s where they started giving out the drug, right?”

The doctor stared at Ronon, not answering.

“Do I need to speak more slowly?" Ronon hissed, matching the doctor's anger.

The witness sighed deeply, then nodded. “Yes, as far as I know. I didn’t work in that part of the hospital. I didn’t administer the drug.”

Ronon paused, studying the scrawled notes on the page in front of him. John frowned, trying to guess where his friend was going with this.

“You treated people though, who had gotten the drug.”

“When they were dying, you mean? Yes, I stayed up for four days and four nights straight, doing all that I could for these people. Have you ever watched a person suffocate to death, right in front of you? Watched them wheeze their last breaths in desperation as their lungs shut down?”

“You don’t like the idea of this drug, do you?”

The doctor flew up out of his chair. “This is ridiculous,” he yelled, facing the judges. “I will not be treated in this matter by this barbarian. Am I on trial here?” He stepped down from the seat, not waiting for an answer.

“I’m not done!” Ronon roared, flying up out his own chair and slamming his fists into the table. John flinched in reaction and felt Carson grab his arm protectively.

“Doctor, you will answer the questions," one of the judges said. "You agreed to participate in the trial.”

John scanned their faces, trying to figure out which one had spoken. A woman with curly red hair, he guessed, based on the glares she was getting from Slick and Shiana. If all the judges had a final say on his guilt, maybe there was a chance for a fair hearing afterall. John felt a little thrill of hope run through him.

The bomb doctor stomped back to his seat and sat down, crossing his arms. His eyes narrowed, his lips turning white as he pressed them together.

“Were you involved in the creation of this drug at all?” Ronon asked.

“No,” the doctor answered, his voice a monotone and his expression stony.

“Did you know about it?”

The doctor didn’t answer.

“Does that mean no? Did the Hoffan government and some secret group of scientists work on this drug without anyone knowing about it?”

The doctor folded his arms, lifting up his chin.

“Okay, how about this?" Ronon said, growing visibly impatient. "This drug-this immunity against the Wraith-it’s probably not even a Hoffan thing. Atlantis got this idea that instead of fighting the Wraith, they could make themselves immune to the whole feeding thing. They needed a planet to test it on, though, and they chose you. They chose Hoff. Am I right? Hoff was full of a bunch of ignorant, naïve, gullible-”

“Do not speak of my people that way!” the doctor roared.

“They’re the victims. Isn’t that what you and those guys-”

“The accuser,” Slick interjected with resignation.

“-said. Atlantis pushed you into trying out this drug that they had invented. It’s a good idea, you know, if it had worked. I bet a lot of planets would have been happy to-”

“You think you can trick me into saying something foolish,” the doctor said, relaxing a little into his chair. He gave Ronon a small smile. “I am no idiot, Satedan.”

“But you believe some stupid story about this Hoffan scientist coming up with an idea for a drug to fight the Wraith, and all these people dying to keep him alive.”

“It is no story. It is fact. Is that what you wanted to hear?”

“Bet he didn’t really have a drug. Bet he just said that so people would stand out front and sacrifice themselves to the Wraith. Maybe he thought he might actually escape-”

“Do not insult the memory of my people. We were brilliant, on the cusp of a new golden age and the greatest discovery this galaxy would have ever seen. Thousands of my people died giving our scientists one last chance to perfect their drug. Every school child on Hoff knows-knew," he corrected with a sneer, "of the greatness of our people. Of what they could accomplish if only they gave themselves over completely to the task."

"And the drug-"

"Would have worked!" he screamed. "But we were rushed into it. You-you made us do it. You must have. After generations of work, thousands of lives devoted to this one project, we would not have thrown it away so quickly. We were so close before the last great culling-second to last, I mean. And then I read the news of the advances we were making, and it was like a dream coming true. You took that away."

"How?"

"You left! The drug was dangerous, unfinished. You knew this, and yet you did not stay to finish the work you had begun."

"We didn't start it," Ronon pointed out. "You just said your people had spent generations working on this."

"We did. But we weren't finished with it. You are twisting my words," the doctor spit out, his face turning red.

"I don't do that," Ronon answered, his voice flat, and despite the clawing pain growing in intensity, John quirked a smile at the response. "Should Atlantis have helped with the drug?"

"Yes," he snapped, then paused. "No. That's not…the purpose of the drug was to make ourselves immune to Wraith feedings. We did not know the Wraith would wipe us out completely when it was discovered that it killed them as well."

"Wasn't that a bonus?"

"No, not if it meant we had to die because of it. This was your fault! You should have warned us-"

"We did."

"And then you left."

"We knew what would happen with the Wraith. We told your Chancellor of the risks and that we would not be a part of a plan that would end in the destruction of an entire civilization. He told us they would pursue it, with or without us."

"So you left. Rather than help us, Atlantis left. They didn't like our plan and didn't want to suffer the consequences of it. You left, and my world died."

"That's all I got for him," Ronon said.

The doctor's face became darker. "You will not soil the memory of my people. We were brilliant. Far more advanced than any world in this galaxy. Atlantis destroyed Hoff. You were too selfish to stick around, even though we'd asked for your help. Your refusal to give it killed my family, my entire world! You will die. I will see to it! All of you… I will take away everything…"

At a signal from Slick, a couple of guards stepped forward, taking the bomb doctor by the arms and dragging him from the room. Shiana looked murderous, glaring at the doctor as he left. His ranting screams were abruptly cut off as a door slammed, and then the room descended into stark quiet.

John let out a rough exhale. It sounded amplified to him in the quiet of the room. He'd forgotten the pain for a moment, as the doctor had raged, but now that the tension in the room had dissipated with the doctor's exit, it slammed into him full force. He moaned, trying to curl up around his gut, and cursed the band holding him up around his chest.

The air flowing from the mask grew stronger as Carson adjusted the flow, and John focused on that. He breathed in, careful not to stretch fiery muscles around the incision.

"Atlantis is being charged with interfering in this galaxy," Ronon said. John strained to fight back the wave of agony enough to hear his friend. "But I want to know where the line is. If we hadn't helped the Hoffans at their request, they would have still pursued this drug. It would have worked the same way, and the Wraith would have destroyed them just the same in the end. Are we to be held responsible for the destruction of the Hoffan people because we did not interfere enough?"

Ronon moved across the room, back to his table, and sat down in the chair. "Let's make this simple. The real question here is whether Atlantis is to be held responsible for everything the Wraith do. The Wraith feed-is that our fault? They build Hive ships and weapons-are we responsible for that? What about the cullings and the destruction that took place before these people," he leaned forward, pointing to John and Carson, "got here. Should we throw them on trial because they didn't get here earlier enough?"

"Don't be ridiculous," Slick said. "You are making arguments well beyond the charges at hand."

"Hoff was fairly advanced. The Wraith don't like that. They destroy worlds that progress too far to keep themselves safe from their herders. They did it to Sateda ten years ago; they did it to Hoff when that world developed a means to fight against them. They've done it to countless other worlds for thousands of years. I get that you're all angry, but it's the Wraith that do this to us. They're the ones we need to be fighting."

Slick scoffed. "You propose we hold a trial for the Wraith?"

"No!" Ronon yelled, on his feet. "Why are we wasting our time here, fighting against the one group of people who have managed to fight the Wraith and win battle after battle? You're all sitting here feeling sorry for yourselves because of what you've lost, but we've all lost. Every generation on every planet in this entire galaxy has lost. You want someone to blame, so you kidnap him, beat him, make him sick, then tie him to a cage for this farce. It won't change what's already happened, and it won't change what the Wraith will continue to do. We need to stop fighting each other and get out there-fight back at the true enemy."

A babble of voices broke out around John, both in the audience and amongst the judges. Slick was banging his fist against the table, trying to get everyone's attention, but to no avail. John felt a sweeping exhaustion move in behind the pain, and he sighed in relief. He was on the verge of passing out, but he'd heard Ronon's argument. His friend had done a good job given what he had to work with. He closed his eyes, letting the pain and fatigue sweep him away for the rest of the day.

OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

The sewer smell grew stronger as the small group pressed forward, and Ronon nodded in satisfaction. Keras and Willa’s directions had gotten the small group within the vicinity of the waterways, and now Ronon’s nose was doing the rest of the work. Clean water flowed in; dirty water flowed out. If they wanted an exit, they needed to follow the water flowing out.

At least that had been his initial logic. As they walked, the tunnels descending toward the sewer smell, it occurred to Ronon that there would be egress points where the clean water was flowing in as well. He shook his head. Didn’t matter. Clean water didn’t smell-at least not as strongly as dirty sewage water. It was much easier tracking a path to the sewer.

He just hoped to hell they didn’t have to actually get in the sewer.

Behind him, Keras and Halling alternated pushing Sheppard in the cart, giving McKay and Beckett a break. Teyla and the rest of their small group brought up the rear, but once they’d broken off the main so-called streets, they saw fewer and fewer people. The area they were in was now devoid of people besides them. It would make explaining their presence difficult, but Ronon would take the risk. And if anyone they met didn’t like their explanation, well, that’s what the gun was for.

The tunnel narrowed then turned, and Ronon heard rushing water ahead. He picked up his pace, tightening his grip on his weapon. There were bound to be more people near the water, even the sewage waterways, after the explosions at the main gate. It was what he would do-double or triple the guards at every entrance and exit to prevent enemies from entering or escaping. This far from the trial, most people didn’t seem to have any information on the explosions, and worst-case scenarios were running rampant.

He saw the dirty water flowing in a wide tunnel ahead of him and he slowed down. He signaled the others to stop, then snuck forward. The lights were darker in the sewage tunnel, the casings covered in a layer of grime. The smell intensified, and Ronon pressed the back of his hand to his nose. He glanced up the tunnel first, then down, but saw no one. Along each side of the river of sewage was a narrow walkway, maybe four feet wide with no safety railing on the edge. They’d have to tread carefully.

He jogged back to the others and explained the layout, then led them forward. The sewer would take them outside-he knew it. Adrenaline thrummed through him, his muscles electrified with excitement. They were close to the end-in a few minutes, his job would be complete and his people out of the fortress. The urge to walk faster and speed along to that end point was almost overwhelming but he forced himself to take it slow. Halling had the cart now and was pushing it along, the wheel on one side just a few inches from the edge.

Ronon spotted another tunnel mouth in the wall ahead and he moved up, intent on clearing it before the others got close to possible danger. Beyond this particular tunnel, the sewer curved, twisting out of sight. With his gun raised, he ducked his head into the darkness, stretching out all of his senses.

Nothing. The tunnel was empty-a single, narrow path that led back toward the city. He could see about 50 feet down it before it curved, so they’d have ample warning if anyone came from that direction. The lights were flickering on and off as well, casting some areas into deep shadows and providing small pockets of cover.

He waved the group forward, eyeing Sheppard the entire time. The ground was flat and solid, but Sheppard’s body still shook and rattled in the cart. Other than dark purple circles under his eyes, his face was ghostly white, almost like he was fading right in front of them. His head bounced and lolled against the back of the cart. The folded jacked he’d been resting against had slid to the side, but Sheppard looked deeply unconscious. His legs swung slightly from the knees down where they hung over the lip of the cart.

Halling slowed, grimacing when the cart gave one final, bouncing lurch. Behind him, the others caught up looking scared and anxious. They were civilians-Ronon had to remember that part. The only trained fighters in the group were himself and Teyla. And McKay, he added, thinking of the bombs his teammate had set off. Despite his tendency to whine and panic, McKay was solid in a battle-not that he’d tell him that anytime soon-especially one that involved getting their team out alive.

“Everyone take cover in here,” he whispered, pointing to the tunnel. “I’m going to scout ahead. The closer we get to the exit, the more likely we are to run into someone.”

They nodded, filing into the tunnel behind Halling and Sheppard. Beckett immediately knelt by their team leader’s side and began checking him over, frowning the second he touched him.

“Beckett?”

Ronon had to ask, even though time was of the essence. Beckett glanced up at him, his face grim. “Still alive.”

He nodded then spun around and took off, not willing to waste another second. He kept as close to the wall as he could, straining in to see ahead of him in the dim lights. The rushing water masked all sounds, which both worked for him and against him.

He didn’t see the next tunnel opening until he was almost on top of it. This one was dark, its lights completely broken. It had looked like nothing more than a shadow on the wall until something pale flickered into sight from within. He slid to a halt, raising his gun.

“Do not move, or I will shoot,” a voice from the shadowy tunnel said. A hand appeared, holding a gun similar in size and model to the one Ronon had. The voice was high-pitched and the hand on the hilt of the gun pointing at him slender. A woman.

“Funny,” Ronon answered, stopping in place. “Was gonna say the same thing.” He’d fought enough battles on enough worlds that it didn’t matter who was behind the gun, and that a woman was just as dangerous as any man. Teyla, for example.

“You’re the Speaker for the Defense,” the voice said.

Ronon’s stomach clenched. “Who are you?”

A head appeared-red curly hair, narrow face. He recognized her as one of the judges. “Kaia. I was at the trial.”

“I remember-you’re a judge. You left before the end.”

“What are you doing here?” she asked, ignoring Ronon’s last comment.

“Looking for a way out.”

“You left your friends?” she asked.

Ronon bit back the urge to growl and just shoot her already. She was a part of this mess, and he’d feel little regret later for clearing the path to escape if it meant Sheppard survived. His finger tightened on the trigger, but he hesitated. Her presence here raised too many questions.

“What are you doing down here?” he asked instead.

“Same as you. Looking for a way out.”

“You’re part of this,” Ronon growled. “Can’t you just walk out the door?”

“Obviously not, Satedan,” she spit back. “The guards of Daet have the entire fortress shut down-no one in or out.” They eyed each other, still holding their weapons up. “Now what?” she asked.

“You tell me.”

“I did not want to be part of this trial to begin with, but my world is small and my leaders felt obligated to send a representative when asked.”

Anger lanced through him at the thought of the trial proceedings Sheppard had suffered through, and he almost pulled the trigger on reflex. He forced his hand to relax slightly.

“I just want to go home, and I assume you do as well.” Her eyes narrowed as she studied him. “You argued passionately for your friend during the trial, as did the others with you. I can’t imagine you’d leave them behind.”

Ronon said nothing, but that was answer enough for Kaia. “There is a heavy door around the next bend that leads to the outside,” she said. “From there, it will be a quick walk to the Ring. When I arrived, there were only two guards, but four more came before I made myself known. They are all heavily armed. The message to lock down Daet has clearly spread to here.”

“Get to the point.”

“I could shout for help. I imagine they would come running instantly. You could shoot me, but that would also alert the guards of your presence.”

Ronon waited. She was driving at something but taking her sweet-assed time getting there.

“On the other hand, I cannot take on six guards by myself, and I have no rational explanation for my presence down here.”

“Then point your gun in the other direction and maybe we can reach an arrangement.”

“I could say the same about you.”

“I don’t need you,” Ronon answered.

“But you do need me to keep quiet.”

“I don’t have time for this.”

Her face softened suddenly and her gun dipped. “I know. Your friend was very ill. Does he live still?”

“Yeah, he lives, but we need to get out of here.” He let his gun drop a little, still pointed at her and ready to shoot, but hopefully not quite so threatening.

“Your arguments in defense of Colonel Sheppard were persuasive-”

“Too bad the trial was a joke,” Ronon interrupted with a snap. He sucked in a deep breath, willing himself to calm down. The running water was loud, but if the guards were as close as Kaia was saying, he had to be quieter.

“Not to all of us,” she hissed back. “Tell me, Ronon of Sateda, how did you defend Colonel Sheppard and Atlantis against the charge of creating the Asurans and turning them loose on the galaxy?”

He shook his head, losing patience with this woman. “You didn’t care to hear it the first time. Why do you care now?”

“I was… indisposed,” she said. “I want to hear your defense.”

He got it then. While the lead judge with the slicked back hair and Shiana had been driving toward one final outcome with this trial, Kaia had come in good faith, prepared to hear both sides. His last trial defense was now, before this woman. If he persuaded her, she would probably let them go, maybe even join them. If he did not, all she had to do was scream or shoot her weapon, and the guards would come running, easily finding him and the rest of his group-armed only with a couple of knives-a few dozen yards back. They would stand no chance against the soldiers.

A scraping sound behind him interrupted his thoughts and he tensed. Kaia’s eyes widened and her gun shifted slightly, wavering between Ronon and whoever was behind him. Ronon held his breath for a moment, prepared to spin out of the gun’s path and kick the person sneaking up on him.

And then he relaxed, sighing as loudly as he dared. “McKay, how many times have I told you not to sneak up on me?”

“I wasn’t sneaking up on you,” the scientist whispered back. “I was coming from the only direction I possibly could have. How’d you know it was me, anyway?”

“You breathe loud.”

McKay huffed, and Ronon let a brief grin play at the corners of his mouth. “See?”

“Shut up. What’s taking so long-” His voice cut off at the sight of Kaia trying to hold a gun on both of them. “Oh.”

“Yeah.”

“Who’s your new friend?”

“One of the judges-Kaia. She wants to hear my defense against the Asurans.”

McKay sputtered, and Ronon knew exactly what kind of face he was making. Kaia frowned, her eyes shifting between the two of them. “Answer me,” she said.

“Or what?” McKay responded, loud enough that Ronon and Kaia both cringed.

“Or she alerts the six armed guards just around the corner,” Ronon whispered.

“Oh.” There was a pause, then a deep breath. “Right,” he whispered back.

“Into the tunnel,” Ronon said, gesturing toward the darkness. “If we’re going to talk, I don’t want the guards to hear us.”

“Maybe I should go back-”

“Stay,” Kaia ordered, training her gun on McKay. She gave Ronon a quick nod and then backed up slowly into the dark tunnel.

They followed her several feet in, stopping only when they could barely see each other. Ronon knew the gun was still pointed toward them, and he kept his leveled at the bare outline of the judge.

“The final charge against Sheppard was in regards to the Asurans,” she started.

“Same story every time,” Rodney huffed. “Atlantis interfered and their actions-through the Asurans-led to millions of deaths. Oh, and Sheppard must pay for them all.”

“He is a leader of Atlantis.”

“Yeah, that makes sense in your twisted view of things,” Rodney shot back. “He’s a proxy for Atlantis, who killed millions of people through their proxies, the Wraith and the Asurans and the Hoffan virus and whatever else your miniscule little brains can come up-”

“McKay, shut up.” In the darkness, Ronon heard his teammate’s mouth snap shut. He turned toward Kaia. “Not that I disagree with him.”

“Your defense,” she said, and her voice sounded smaller in here, less confident. Less certain of her plan to hear his final argument in the first place.

“Okay,” he started. “McKay’s right. The accuser’s argument is the same-Atlantis either interferes too much or doesn’t interfere enough, and no one’s ever happy about it. We heard about the Asurans in… um…”

“Oh, for heaven’s sake,” McKay interrupted. “This is why I’m here.” He shifted, his back scraping along the tunnel wall. “Based on what we’ve uncovered, the Asurans were originally conceived of as a weapon that would attack Wraith DNA directly. They built nanites-”

“Nanites?” Kaia asked.

“Little tiny machines, and by tiny I mean miniscule-small enough to flow through a person’s or a Wraith’s veins-”

“Cliff Notes version, McKay.”

The scientist huffed again, then jerked toward Ronon. “How do you know about Cliff Notes?”

Ronon growled, which elicited a long sigh from his teammate. “Okay, on task. The short version: the Ancients built little machines to fight the Wraith, but then the little machines started replicating and then joining together until they took the form of the Ancients themselves-machines the size and appearance of people.”

“This is possible?”

“Yes, obviously,” McKay snapped. “They were machines with computer coding-I don’t suppose you have any idea what that means?” He paused for a brief second, hardly giving Kaia a chance to respond before continuing. “The Ancients removed the part of their code that made them aggressive-turned it off, so to speak-but then they weren’t a weapon anymore and had to be destroyed, yadda yadda yadda. The Ancients, of course, utterly failed to destroy them completely, we found them, they tried to kill us-”

“So you acted in self-defense in response.”

“Yes,” McKay said. “No. Wait. I’m not finished. We escaped, but they hated the Ancients and tried to destroy Atlantis twice, at least. When we realized they were built as a weapon against the Wraith, we… turned that part of them back on.”

He paused again, waiting for a response, but Kaia was silent. Ronon placed a hand on McKay’s arm to stop him and picked up the story. “It worked at first. They started attacking the Wraith, destroyed a dozen hive ships. You sit there in judgment over 2 million people who died because of Atlantis. What about all the people who lived because of us? Dead Wraith can’t feed.”

“But you admit to turning the Asurans back into aggressors?”

“Their sole purpose was to destroy the Wraith, but after attacking the hives directly, they decided that it would be less costly for them to take out the people the Wraith fed on. Starve the Wraith-not a strategy anyone considered.”

“But that does not change the fact that they began destroying worlds, killing people who may have otherwise lived.”

McKay squirmed, unable to contain himself. “It’s in their nature. The Wraith feed. That’s who they are. We can’t be held responsible for that.”

“But we can be held responsible for the Asurans’ nature,” Ronon said. “We changed it. We made them aggressors.”

“Who’s side are you on anyway?” he yelled.

Ronon and Kaia both shushed him. Ronon turned toward the tunnel, listening for any sign of the guards. After several long seconds, no guards rushed past in search of them. He turned back to McKay and Kaia.

“I know,” McKay whispered. “Sorry.”

“Kaia, all I can say in our defense is that our intentions were to stop the Wraith from feeding on the people of this galaxy and taking more innocent lives. When we realized the Asurans had shifted their strategy from attacking Hive ships to attacking human worlds, we acted.”

He paused, considering what to tell her. Few people would understand forming an alliance with the Wraith, and trying to explain that would take too much time. “Atlantis is not the only advanced civilization in this galaxy,” he said instead. “We got as many ships together as we could and as much help as we could, including from a group called the Travelers, and we attacked the Asurans. We destroyed them.”

“How do I know this is true?”

“Heard of any Asuran attacks recently?” McKay bit back, quietly this time. Kaia didn’t answer and McKay pressed on. “One of the Travelers is-or was-here, waiting in her ship for word to come down and testify to what happened in that battle. You may still get a chance to talk to her, if we ever get out of here, but for now you have to trust us. The Asurans are gone-all of them. We’re sorry for what they did, but we didn’t run away and hide when things started to go wrong.”

They sat there, waiting for a response from her but she was silent. Ronon dragged a hand over his face, wondering how much time had passed. They’d given her the gist of his defense against the Asurans and now it was up to her to decide.

A thought occurred to him. “Why weren’t you in the courtroom for the last charge?”

He studied her faint outline in the darkness and saw her shoulders slump. “This trial was never intended to be fair. I know that now, but before it started… We were told many things about your Colonel Sheppard and he sounded like a monster. The accuser’s statements in courts were mere echoes of what we’d heard already. But once you began defending him, I don’t know… it changed things, at least for a few of us. We began to doubt the story we’d been told. Shiana was furious with you. It had been her idea to appoint you the defender, and those in charge of the trial had been convinced you were little more than a barbaric, uneducated thug in Sheppard’s employ.”

Ronon growled, and Kaia’s head snapped up in alarm. “Those were not my words,” she whispered. “Some of us expressed our doubts, questioned the story we’d been initially told behind closed doors. We were led to a room, then locked up, prevented from participating in the rest of the trial. I don’t know what the other judges were told or what our fates would have been. When we heard the explosion, we broke out of the room and fled.”

Ronon felt Kaia’s hand on his arm. “Please,” she begged. “Perhaps Atlantis holds some guilt when it comes to the Asurans’ actions, but in my heart, I cannot find you or Colonel Sheppard guilty of the charges as a whole. I would have voted for his innocence. I just want to go home now.”

She tugged on his arm, and then he felt her pressing her gun into his hand. “Please help me.”

He pulled the gun away from her, holding one in each hand. It was still a risk bringing her with them but he saw no other option. And it was what Sheppard would do.

“Okay,” he whispered. “Let’s get the others. We’ve wasted enough time already.”

McKay’s sucked in a quick breath but said nothing. They crept back to the waterway tunnel, checked for guards, then led them back to the others.

One last barrier-one last battle-and then they would be free.

OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

Part 4