fic: The Survivors - PG-13 [gen, Teyla, John]
TITLE: The Survivors
SUMMARY: Waiting for Atlantis to pick them up after a returning goes astray, survival is hard, but dying is harder.
CATEGORY: action-adventure, hurt/comfort
RATING: PG-13
DISCLAIMER: Not mine, making no money, etc.
SPOILERS: Set during Season 5, although no specific time.
NOTES: A pinch-hit for kristen999 in the 2008 John&Teyla Thing-A-Thon over at john_teyla_fic. She wanted 'action, strength, physical comfort', 'Both having to protect the other or Both being soldiers' and 'Fierce!Teyla, vulnerable or hurt John'. I'm so sorry for the delay over even getting even this much out.
The Survivors
Teyla woke in twilight with her cheek resting on hard dirt.
Her last memory was of running through the Stargate, John no more than a step behind, as explosions burst around them. There had been others just ahead of them, Ronon herding them through as Rodney's gabbled explanations to Woolsey sounded in their earpieces, transmitted through the open Stargate from Atlantis.
She had seen Ronon go through behind all but one of the evacuees, remembered that one man between her and the gate as her ears reverberated with the shock of an explosion greater, even, than the others she had experienced. One more step, and she'd gone through, with John one step behind her.
The Stargate had been open to Atlantis, but this was certainly not the city.
Teyla began to push herself up and found there was a mild weight pressing her into the ground - the backpack she'd been carrying. She began to shrug the pack off her shoulders, then gasped lightly as a sharp pang in her hip dropped her back to the ground.
A sharper pang hit her in the chest as her eyes made out the shadowy figure who lay in the dirt, jacket-limbs splayed, the fall of his dark hair showing his head twisted at an unnatural angle.
Panic gave her strength beyond the pain. Nothing seemed broken or strained as she moved, only bruised and sore. Grit scraped through her fingers as she scrabbled over...and breathed a shameful sigh of relief when she saw the face. A moment later, guilt and grief came, hand in hand. Perhaps this man was not one of her team-mates, but was a man from Earth whose family would never see him again.
Her breath caught as she thought of her own family - of Torran, still so young but growing every day, of Kanaan, waiting patiently for her to return to the city.
She forced away the fear that she would never see them again, and felt for a pulse, a useless gesture. This man's neck was clearly broken, and the pale of his fatigues were coloured with a darker stain around his abdomen.
"What 'bout me?"
The voice startled Teyla and she twisted around. Then she caught her breath as her side stung sharply. "John?"
"'S my name," John said gruffly as she crawled over. "Don't wear't out."
He sounded like he was in pain, and when Teyla saw him, she realised why. It seemed that they'd been expelled from the Stargate, spat out onto this world instead of Atlantis. The fall had killed the Marine where it had only bruised Teyla. John had landed hard on his left side, close to a rock. The angle of his arm suggested dislocation, and his right leg did not look entirely straight.
"What hurts?"
"Everything." Even in the last light of the day, his expression coloured with humour, John looked grey. "Shoulder's dislocated. Leg hurts enough to be broken. Check the DHD. Then help."
Teyla grimaced. "I can reset your shoulder now." It would be one less pain for him to endure.
His chest rose and fell, steady, forced breaths between clenched teeth. "Was afraid you'd say that. Do it."
Teyla knelt beside him, putting her hands on his shoulder and his arm, the grip firm, careful as she felt the twist of bone and flesh. She had done this before, both among her people and among the Lanteans; it was not a new thing to do, although she had not known the specifics of what she was doing until she'd asked Carson. Still, resetting a dislocation never a pleasant thing for either patient or physician. "This will hurt."
"When doesn't it?"
John let loose muffled grunt of pain as she shoved his arm back into its socket with a noise that was somewhere between a pop and a crack. What little colour he'd had by the last fading light of the sky drained away, though his breathing only hitched slightly when she probed the shoulder with gentle fingers.
"Try it."
He tested the arm, breath hissing out. "Okay."
Teyla let loose a soft breath, flashed him a brief smile, then climbed to her feet and went to the frame of the DHD. John's shoulder was easily fixable; it made no sense to leave him in that much pain. But his leg should get the best care possible. A call to Atlantis would bring Carson and a medical team through...
But here her thoughts stuttered.
Even in the half-light of twilight, there was no mistaking the gaping hole in the centre of the DHD. Broken edges of the buttons gaped like fractured teeth, the light forever gone from behind their identifying sigils. Someone had once used a significant amount of firepower to ensure that no-one without a portable dialling device would ever leave through this Stargate.
A quick gleam of her pocket torch into the hole showed fused metal, melted glass, and burned stone. Whatever had burned here had burned fierce and hot for all it had burned small. It had destroyed any capability that might have once existed in this device. There would be no contacting Atlantis this way.
For a moment, she felt the situation press in on her, claustrophobic responsibility. A second later, she exhaled, reminding herself that both she and John had their locator implants and that Atlantis would come for them.
Until then, they would simply have to survive.
Teyla flicked off the torch, pocketed it, and went for her backpack. They would need to find shelter, food, and water until Atlantis found them. Before then, she would have to set John's leg.
"Can't phone home?" John asked as she knelt beside him.
"The centre of the DHD has been slagged," she explained. "The crystal is gone and much of the processing components also."
"Just you 'n me, then."
"Yes. Does your head hurt?"
"Not concussed."
She glanced up at him from the backpack's contents, gauging his truthfulness. It would not be beyond John to lie if he felt the need of it.
"Not lying," he said, seeing her look and correctly interpreting it.
Her mouth twitched as she pulled out a small chemical glow that she snapped to provide a pale light by which to see. The light had its own dangers - the curiosity of night-time creatures of this planet might well be fatal if they were large and dangerous enough, but without the light, she would not be able to see what she was doing. "Do you blame me for asking?"
"No." John murmured. She saw his hand move to take his sidearm out and flick the safety off. He followed her gaze to the gun and grinned, a brief baring of his teeth. "If it hurts too much."
"Will you be shooting me or you?"
He huff-laughed. "You."
"I am insulted by your lack of faith." But her heart lightented as she pulled out the expandable splints and set them on either side of his leg. If John was up to making jokes, their situation was not so dire. She made sure she knew where the bandages and wraps were and that there were enough for the bone-setting, and pulled out a painkiller packet.
"No."
"John, this will hurt."
"Already does," his lips pulled back in a grin - or a grimace. Either way, it faded after a moment, leaking pain as a punctured waterskin leaked liquid until it was empty.
"Would you like something on which to bite down?"
He hesitated, then nodded, and Teyla offered him a small rigid length of plastic from the medikit. The bite-pieces had been Ronon's suggestion to Carson early on in his time in the city: Sometimes you need your wits during a field-fix - and something to bite.
John needed his wits now, but Teyla would rather he did not bite his tongue in two. She could set his leg, but she could make no promises of painlessness.
She doubted there was a physician in all of two galaxies who could.
The setting of John's leg was a protracted, messy business.
The skin was not broken, but there was certainly a break in the bone - Teyla felt the unnatural movement of something hard beneath the surface. She prayed to the Ancestors that if there was bleeding beneath the skin, it was minor and not a major vessel.
Teyla laid the leg out straight, splinted it, and bound it tightly to the splints. Not a perfect setting, but it was done and would last them long enough. Then she looked at her patient. Even by the luminescence of the chemical glow-rod, snapped to provide her with more light when the sun vanished behind the tree-tops, John was an ashy grey and his knuckles were white around the grip of the gun. He'd been entirely silent during the ordeal.
"It is finished."
He spat the bite-piece from his mouth and let out a long, shuddering breath. "Thanks," he managed, and his lips flickered into the briefest curve of a smile. "I think. Shelter?"
"Shelter," Teyla agreed. "We have food to support us for three days, and water."
"Enough."
"Yes."
They must survive until Atlantis found them - not very long, she was sure. Their locator implants would appear on the sub-space scanners, and when the Daedelus arrived in Pegasus, they would be rescued - if not before if there was a Stargate within 'jumper range.
And if it took longer for Atlantis to reach them, then three days was enough time for them to judge the lay of the land.
"Will you take a painkiller now?"
"Save it for bedtime," he said, although she could hear the suppressed pain in his voice. "Help me up."
"I thought that, perhaps, it might be wiser for me to go looking--"
"We stay together."
Teyla reflected that she had tried, albeit with about as much success as should have been expected when suggesting such a thing to John. Still, she put off moving him, at least for the moment. Instead she turned her head to the dead soldier. "I should see to him first."
John's mouth opened, then closed. Perhaps he knew it was a delaying tactic, to give him time to recover, but he only nodded. After ensuring he was comfortable, Teyla crossed to the dead marine and began arranging him and emptying his pockets.
Unlike the Lanteans, she had no compunction about taking from the dead. In times of plenty, Athosian dead were burned in their robes, and in times of need, they were burned beneath a cloth covering. The needs of the living had priority over the dignity of the dead.
Still, she laid him out carefully, respectful of his people's ways. They would take his jacket as a spare since the night's chill was growing, but he could retain his clothing.
The name on his dogtags was Edward William Hill, he'd been a Master Sergeant, and he'd been of the Catholic faith. As she slipped his tags around her neck for safekeeping, Teyla said a prayer for him and hoped it would be acceptable to his deity. His waterbottle was attached to her vest, his radio went into the backpack as a spare. She found two spare clips for his sidearm in his vest, as well as a packet of chewing gum, a small book of notes and sketches, some butterscotch sweets in his hip pocket, and a strange round thing that felt unlike anything she could imagine.
It turned out to be a yo-yo - sunshine-yellow with tiny sparkles in the plastic that glittered in the day's last light.
"What is it?"
She tossed it to John and he made a 'huh' noise, and it vanished into one of his own vest pockets.
And then there was nothing more but to lay Sergeant Hill out on the cold ground and ponder what to do with him.
"Can we bury him?"
"What is this 'we' of whom you speak?" Teyla inquired wryly, although she had been wondering the same thing.
However, there seemed to be very little loose rock around the Stargate and with the sun set, darkness was falling around them, like a heavy curtain around the inside of a tent. She would prefer to see John comfortable for the night than stumble around trying to bury Sergeant Hill.
"John, I think we should find shelter for the night. It would be best to come back and deal with him tomorrow."
If they had both been whole, Teyla would not have hesitated to stop to bury the man, even in darkness. But John was still in pain, and she did not want to spend a night out in the open with an injured man. She had thought she heard thunder earlier and the prospect of being rained upon did not appeal, although now the sky looked clear.
John looked like he wanted to argue, but he conceded to the practicality of the issue. "Okay. Let's get outta here. High ground, or low?"
The initial question was not 'high ground, or low' but whether they could get John to his feet without him collapsing from the pain.
It was a painstaking process for her and a painful one for him. By the time they'd gotten him upright, his whole body was rigid with pain for all that he made no outcry. And Teyla bit her lip and offered neither platitudes nor encouragement, knowing he neither wanted nor needed them.
"Which way?" He rasped in the last light.
"Up," she said, having made the decision while helping him to his feet. She would have preferred to go down, given the state of John's leg. But higher ground would give them a vantage point with a little more protection if it came to defence.
It was clear that the Stargate wasn't used by the locals on this planet. Perhaps it was considered one less way for the Wraith to come at them, or maybe this planet had never felt the cullings of the Wraith. Until they encountered the people who lived on this planet - if there were any - they wouldn't know.
Their progress was slow, John's weight heavy on her shoulders, his movements laboured. But by daylight, Teyla had seen an outcropping a little way up the slope, an overhang to give them shelter for the night, and she aimed them for that, moving carefully through the dry grass and scrubby brush that surrounded the Stargate.
Teyla was more focused on reaching the shelter than she was on their surroundings, although a part of her was always alert, as she had learned to be when on unfamiliar planets. Still, she heard the noises of the twilight all around them - the daylight creatures going to ground as the evening creatures peered out of their burrows and holes and sniffed the evening breeze. Somewhere, distantly, she thought she heard thunder again, and frowned up at the twinkling night sky.
John said nothing, and his grip was merciless on her shoulder as they limped through the brush. From the tension in his arm and chest, Teyla suspected most of his energy was focused on pain management, and wished she had insisted he take the painkillers before they moved. No help for it now, they must forge on until they reached their resting place for the night.
It felt like most of the night had passed when they reached the overhang - a narrow ledge that would protect them from the morning dew, and thickly carpeted with long, reedy grass. "Good enough," John rasped, clearly still in pain, and they set about easing him down again.
They were nearly there when Teyla heard the rumble of thunder again, closer and louder this time. She thought nothing of it, but beneath her arm, John tensed. His ribs jerked with the catch of his breath and he stilled.
"John?"
The thunder came again - a deep rumble that rolled out across the hills, clearer than it had been before - the hills seemed to amplify the sound up to them. John was staring out into the sky, his gaze blind, and Teyla looked up at him and realised that he was not seeking rain clouds, but a memory.
"What is it?"
John was still frozen, and her knees were beginning to burn from their crouching position, neither up nor down. Still, she held on, and his fingers tightened on her shoulder as the noise rolled out again, a booming sound that swept through the hills, unfamiliar to her but clearly known to John. "It is not thunder," she said, more statement than question.
"No," he said, softly. "That's heavy artillery."
He glanced down at her incomprehension, and his gaze was grim and dark as another great crash sounded out through the night air. "Big guns, Teyla. There's a war going on down there."
- fin -
NOTES: I hope to finish this someday (along with every other multipart story that I've got stored in the back of my brain and half-started on my computer), but it will probably have to wait until at least the new year.
Again, Kristen, I'm sorry for taking so long to get even this much out to you!
SUMMARY: Waiting for Atlantis to pick them up after a returning goes astray, survival is hard, but dying is harder.
CATEGORY: action-adventure, hurt/comfort
RATING: PG-13
DISCLAIMER: Not mine, making no money, etc.
SPOILERS: Set during Season 5, although no specific time.
NOTES: A pinch-hit for kristen999 in the 2008 John&Teyla Thing-A-Thon over at john_teyla_fic. She wanted 'action, strength, physical comfort', 'Both having to protect the other or Both being soldiers' and 'Fierce!Teyla, vulnerable or hurt John'. I'm so sorry for the delay over even getting even this much out.
The Survivors
Teyla woke in twilight with her cheek resting on hard dirt.
Her last memory was of running through the Stargate, John no more than a step behind, as explosions burst around them. There had been others just ahead of them, Ronon herding them through as Rodney's gabbled explanations to Woolsey sounded in their earpieces, transmitted through the open Stargate from Atlantis.
She had seen Ronon go through behind all but one of the evacuees, remembered that one man between her and the gate as her ears reverberated with the shock of an explosion greater, even, than the others she had experienced. One more step, and she'd gone through, with John one step behind her.
The Stargate had been open to Atlantis, but this was certainly not the city.
Teyla began to push herself up and found there was a mild weight pressing her into the ground - the backpack she'd been carrying. She began to shrug the pack off her shoulders, then gasped lightly as a sharp pang in her hip dropped her back to the ground.
A sharper pang hit her in the chest as her eyes made out the shadowy figure who lay in the dirt, jacket-limbs splayed, the fall of his dark hair showing his head twisted at an unnatural angle.
Panic gave her strength beyond the pain. Nothing seemed broken or strained as she moved, only bruised and sore. Grit scraped through her fingers as she scrabbled over...and breathed a shameful sigh of relief when she saw the face. A moment later, guilt and grief came, hand in hand. Perhaps this man was not one of her team-mates, but was a man from Earth whose family would never see him again.
Her breath caught as she thought of her own family - of Torran, still so young but growing every day, of Kanaan, waiting patiently for her to return to the city.
She forced away the fear that she would never see them again, and felt for a pulse, a useless gesture. This man's neck was clearly broken, and the pale of his fatigues were coloured with a darker stain around his abdomen.
"What 'bout me?"
The voice startled Teyla and she twisted around. Then she caught her breath as her side stung sharply. "John?"
"'S my name," John said gruffly as she crawled over. "Don't wear't out."
He sounded like he was in pain, and when Teyla saw him, she realised why. It seemed that they'd been expelled from the Stargate, spat out onto this world instead of Atlantis. The fall had killed the Marine where it had only bruised Teyla. John had landed hard on his left side, close to a rock. The angle of his arm suggested dislocation, and his right leg did not look entirely straight.
"What hurts?"
"Everything." Even in the last light of the day, his expression coloured with humour, John looked grey. "Shoulder's dislocated. Leg hurts enough to be broken. Check the DHD. Then help."
Teyla grimaced. "I can reset your shoulder now." It would be one less pain for him to endure.
His chest rose and fell, steady, forced breaths between clenched teeth. "Was afraid you'd say that. Do it."
Teyla knelt beside him, putting her hands on his shoulder and his arm, the grip firm, careful as she felt the twist of bone and flesh. She had done this before, both among her people and among the Lanteans; it was not a new thing to do, although she had not known the specifics of what she was doing until she'd asked Carson. Still, resetting a dislocation never a pleasant thing for either patient or physician. "This will hurt."
"When doesn't it?"
John let loose muffled grunt of pain as she shoved his arm back into its socket with a noise that was somewhere between a pop and a crack. What little colour he'd had by the last fading light of the sky drained away, though his breathing only hitched slightly when she probed the shoulder with gentle fingers.
"Try it."
He tested the arm, breath hissing out. "Okay."
Teyla let loose a soft breath, flashed him a brief smile, then climbed to her feet and went to the frame of the DHD. John's shoulder was easily fixable; it made no sense to leave him in that much pain. But his leg should get the best care possible. A call to Atlantis would bring Carson and a medical team through...
But here her thoughts stuttered.
Even in the half-light of twilight, there was no mistaking the gaping hole in the centre of the DHD. Broken edges of the buttons gaped like fractured teeth, the light forever gone from behind their identifying sigils. Someone had once used a significant amount of firepower to ensure that no-one without a portable dialling device would ever leave through this Stargate.
A quick gleam of her pocket torch into the hole showed fused metal, melted glass, and burned stone. Whatever had burned here had burned fierce and hot for all it had burned small. It had destroyed any capability that might have once existed in this device. There would be no contacting Atlantis this way.
For a moment, she felt the situation press in on her, claustrophobic responsibility. A second later, she exhaled, reminding herself that both she and John had their locator implants and that Atlantis would come for them.
Until then, they would simply have to survive.
Teyla flicked off the torch, pocketed it, and went for her backpack. They would need to find shelter, food, and water until Atlantis found them. Before then, she would have to set John's leg.
"Can't phone home?" John asked as she knelt beside him.
"The centre of the DHD has been slagged," she explained. "The crystal is gone and much of the processing components also."
"Just you 'n me, then."
"Yes. Does your head hurt?"
"Not concussed."
She glanced up at him from the backpack's contents, gauging his truthfulness. It would not be beyond John to lie if he felt the need of it.
"Not lying," he said, seeing her look and correctly interpreting it.
Her mouth twitched as she pulled out a small chemical glow that she snapped to provide a pale light by which to see. The light had its own dangers - the curiosity of night-time creatures of this planet might well be fatal if they were large and dangerous enough, but without the light, she would not be able to see what she was doing. "Do you blame me for asking?"
"No." John murmured. She saw his hand move to take his sidearm out and flick the safety off. He followed her gaze to the gun and grinned, a brief baring of his teeth. "If it hurts too much."
"Will you be shooting me or you?"
He huff-laughed. "You."
"I am insulted by your lack of faith." But her heart lightented as she pulled out the expandable splints and set them on either side of his leg. If John was up to making jokes, their situation was not so dire. She made sure she knew where the bandages and wraps were and that there were enough for the bone-setting, and pulled out a painkiller packet.
"No."
"John, this will hurt."
"Already does," his lips pulled back in a grin - or a grimace. Either way, it faded after a moment, leaking pain as a punctured waterskin leaked liquid until it was empty.
"Would you like something on which to bite down?"
He hesitated, then nodded, and Teyla offered him a small rigid length of plastic from the medikit. The bite-pieces had been Ronon's suggestion to Carson early on in his time in the city: Sometimes you need your wits during a field-fix - and something to bite.
John needed his wits now, but Teyla would rather he did not bite his tongue in two. She could set his leg, but she could make no promises of painlessness.
She doubted there was a physician in all of two galaxies who could.
The setting of John's leg was a protracted, messy business.
The skin was not broken, but there was certainly a break in the bone - Teyla felt the unnatural movement of something hard beneath the surface. She prayed to the Ancestors that if there was bleeding beneath the skin, it was minor and not a major vessel.
Teyla laid the leg out straight, splinted it, and bound it tightly to the splints. Not a perfect setting, but it was done and would last them long enough. Then she looked at her patient. Even by the luminescence of the chemical glow-rod, snapped to provide her with more light when the sun vanished behind the tree-tops, John was an ashy grey and his knuckles were white around the grip of the gun. He'd been entirely silent during the ordeal.
"It is finished."
He spat the bite-piece from his mouth and let out a long, shuddering breath. "Thanks," he managed, and his lips flickered into the briefest curve of a smile. "I think. Shelter?"
"Shelter," Teyla agreed. "We have food to support us for three days, and water."
"Enough."
"Yes."
They must survive until Atlantis found them - not very long, she was sure. Their locator implants would appear on the sub-space scanners, and when the Daedelus arrived in Pegasus, they would be rescued - if not before if there was a Stargate within 'jumper range.
And if it took longer for Atlantis to reach them, then three days was enough time for them to judge the lay of the land.
"Will you take a painkiller now?"
"Save it for bedtime," he said, although she could hear the suppressed pain in his voice. "Help me up."
"I thought that, perhaps, it might be wiser for me to go looking--"
"We stay together."
Teyla reflected that she had tried, albeit with about as much success as should have been expected when suggesting such a thing to John. Still, she put off moving him, at least for the moment. Instead she turned her head to the dead soldier. "I should see to him first."
John's mouth opened, then closed. Perhaps he knew it was a delaying tactic, to give him time to recover, but he only nodded. After ensuring he was comfortable, Teyla crossed to the dead marine and began arranging him and emptying his pockets.
Unlike the Lanteans, she had no compunction about taking from the dead. In times of plenty, Athosian dead were burned in their robes, and in times of need, they were burned beneath a cloth covering. The needs of the living had priority over the dignity of the dead.
Still, she laid him out carefully, respectful of his people's ways. They would take his jacket as a spare since the night's chill was growing, but he could retain his clothing.
The name on his dogtags was Edward William Hill, he'd been a Master Sergeant, and he'd been of the Catholic faith. As she slipped his tags around her neck for safekeeping, Teyla said a prayer for him and hoped it would be acceptable to his deity. His waterbottle was attached to her vest, his radio went into the backpack as a spare. She found two spare clips for his sidearm in his vest, as well as a packet of chewing gum, a small book of notes and sketches, some butterscotch sweets in his hip pocket, and a strange round thing that felt unlike anything she could imagine.
It turned out to be a yo-yo - sunshine-yellow with tiny sparkles in the plastic that glittered in the day's last light.
"What is it?"
She tossed it to John and he made a 'huh' noise, and it vanished into one of his own vest pockets.
And then there was nothing more but to lay Sergeant Hill out on the cold ground and ponder what to do with him.
"Can we bury him?"
"What is this 'we' of whom you speak?" Teyla inquired wryly, although she had been wondering the same thing.
However, there seemed to be very little loose rock around the Stargate and with the sun set, darkness was falling around them, like a heavy curtain around the inside of a tent. She would prefer to see John comfortable for the night than stumble around trying to bury Sergeant Hill.
"John, I think we should find shelter for the night. It would be best to come back and deal with him tomorrow."
If they had both been whole, Teyla would not have hesitated to stop to bury the man, even in darkness. But John was still in pain, and she did not want to spend a night out in the open with an injured man. She had thought she heard thunder earlier and the prospect of being rained upon did not appeal, although now the sky looked clear.
John looked like he wanted to argue, but he conceded to the practicality of the issue. "Okay. Let's get outta here. High ground, or low?"
The initial question was not 'high ground, or low' but whether they could get John to his feet without him collapsing from the pain.
It was a painstaking process for her and a painful one for him. By the time they'd gotten him upright, his whole body was rigid with pain for all that he made no outcry. And Teyla bit her lip and offered neither platitudes nor encouragement, knowing he neither wanted nor needed them.
"Which way?" He rasped in the last light.
"Up," she said, having made the decision while helping him to his feet. She would have preferred to go down, given the state of John's leg. But higher ground would give them a vantage point with a little more protection if it came to defence.
It was clear that the Stargate wasn't used by the locals on this planet. Perhaps it was considered one less way for the Wraith to come at them, or maybe this planet had never felt the cullings of the Wraith. Until they encountered the people who lived on this planet - if there were any - they wouldn't know.
Their progress was slow, John's weight heavy on her shoulders, his movements laboured. But by daylight, Teyla had seen an outcropping a little way up the slope, an overhang to give them shelter for the night, and she aimed them for that, moving carefully through the dry grass and scrubby brush that surrounded the Stargate.
Teyla was more focused on reaching the shelter than she was on their surroundings, although a part of her was always alert, as she had learned to be when on unfamiliar planets. Still, she heard the noises of the twilight all around them - the daylight creatures going to ground as the evening creatures peered out of their burrows and holes and sniffed the evening breeze. Somewhere, distantly, she thought she heard thunder again, and frowned up at the twinkling night sky.
John said nothing, and his grip was merciless on her shoulder as they limped through the brush. From the tension in his arm and chest, Teyla suspected most of his energy was focused on pain management, and wished she had insisted he take the painkillers before they moved. No help for it now, they must forge on until they reached their resting place for the night.
It felt like most of the night had passed when they reached the overhang - a narrow ledge that would protect them from the morning dew, and thickly carpeted with long, reedy grass. "Good enough," John rasped, clearly still in pain, and they set about easing him down again.
They were nearly there when Teyla heard the rumble of thunder again, closer and louder this time. She thought nothing of it, but beneath her arm, John tensed. His ribs jerked with the catch of his breath and he stilled.
"John?"
The thunder came again - a deep rumble that rolled out across the hills, clearer than it had been before - the hills seemed to amplify the sound up to them. John was staring out into the sky, his gaze blind, and Teyla looked up at him and realised that he was not seeking rain clouds, but a memory.
"What is it?"
John was still frozen, and her knees were beginning to burn from their crouching position, neither up nor down. Still, she held on, and his fingers tightened on her shoulder as the noise rolled out again, a booming sound that swept through the hills, unfamiliar to her but clearly known to John. "It is not thunder," she said, more statement than question.
"No," he said, softly. "That's heavy artillery."
He glanced down at her incomprehension, and his gaze was grim and dark as another great crash sounded out through the night air. "Big guns, Teyla. There's a war going on down there."
- fin -
NOTES: I hope to finish this someday (along with every other multipart story that I've got stored in the back of my brain and half-started on my computer), but it will probably have to wait until at least the new year.
Again, Kristen, I'm sorry for taking so long to get even this much out to you!