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“When the time comes to you at which you will be forced at last to utter the speech which has lain at the center of your soul for years, which you have, all that time, idiot-like, been saying over and over, you'll not talk about the joy of words. ... why should they hear the babble that we think we mean? How can they meet us face to face till we have faces?”
― C.S. Lewis, Till We Have Faces
"We have a situation."
The voice belonged to General O'Neill. That explained the hush that came over the mess hall a few moments ago. Cam looked up, saying, "Sir," and starting to rise, but O'Neill gestured for him to stay seated. The general was standing with a cup of coffee in his hand, as if that was the reason he had come down, but Cam knew that generals didn't need to fetch their own joe. Or maybe that was just General Landry, who was in DC for an extended visit. O'Neill had stepped back to fill in, and it had been weeks. Something was seriously going on with Landry. O'Neill blinked at Cam. "You about done with lunch there?"
Cam looked at his plate with its scraps of salad, a sloppy joe half eaten, the beans mostly gone. "Sure," he said.
"Let's take a walk."
Cam wiped grease from his fingers and tossed the napkin on to the plate. "Yes, sir."
He rose, and O'Neill said, "Your tray?"
"Yes sir," Cam said, feeling warmth in his face. He'd figured that whatever the general wanted was worth annoying the mess crew, but it seemed that O'Neill didn't agree. He waited while Cam bussed his tray, sipping coffee and smiling benignly at the marines and airmen trying to pretend that there wasn't a brigadier in their midst. When he was done, they walked out to the hall. "Where to, sir?"
"Let's just walk."
O'Neill said nothing as they walked, and Cam stole a glance to see the same benign smile being spread around the many people they passed. Eventually O'Neill pushed open the door to a stairwell, led Cam down three flights, and then into a hall Cam rarely needed to go down. It was much less crowded than the area near the mess hall, and O'Neill led him down the corridor about twenty feet, took a side hallway, and then stopped. There was no one else in sight, and Cam felt somehow sure that there were no cameras or listening devices here. O'Neill leaned against the wall, sipped his coffee, and looked at Cam over the top rim of the cup.
"Sir?" Cam ventured.
O'Neill took another sip, and without lowering the cup from in front of his mouth said, "Lieutenant Colonel John Sheppard."
Cam could hear O'Neill pronouncing every syllable, and felt his face going cold. "Sir?" he said again. No matter how careful he and Sheppard had been, someone, somewhere in the SGC would know, so Gen. O'Neill bringing this up now and here where surveillance was minimal? This couldn't mean anything good. Sheppard had gone out on loan with SG-17, and they were overdue.
"Don't worry, Mitchell," O'Neill said, his voice quiet. "I'm not here to bust you for kissing boys."
Cam felt the blood drain from his face. He'd done a hell of a lot more with Sheppard than kiss him. "Sir?"
"You pack a lot into that one word," O'Neill said dryly.
Cam inhaled. "You said there was a situation?"
"You know he was out with SG-17."
Cam closed his eyes, just for a moment, dread settling in his chest. He and Sheppard were both airmen, soldiers. Risk was part of the deal. That didn't make it easier. "I know they're late, sir," he said. He took another breath, not sure what he could ask.
"They're back," O'Neill said. "Without Sheppard. I know what you're thinking. He's not dead." Cam felt a surge of relief, but then O'Neill added, "Yet."
"Yet?" Cam repeated. It hadn't been what he was thinking, but now the dread sent tendrils into his lungs. "What's going on?"
O’Neill swallowed and looked down. This was very bad, then. "Y'know," O'Neill said slowly, "I really hate fairy tales. And I really hate it when we have to deal with them. You know."
Cam knew. Going on his own Arthurian quest had been annoying, to say the least. SG-1 had a long history of dealing with the Ancient reality behind Tau'ri legends. "What fairy tale is Sheppard in, sir?"
"Rapunzel? I don't know. Look, there's going to be a formal briefing at 14:00. We've already sent SG-2, but it seems they're missing the essential piece." O'Neill sipped his coffee again, not making eye contact.
"Sir?" Cam said, "Atlantis has all the cool toys. What could we have that they don't have? Goa'uld tech? Asgard beaming technology?"
"It's not a what, son, it's a who." O'Neill ran his hand down his face. "I really hate fairy tales."
Cam felt his toes curl, tense in his boots. He wished the general would just get to the point. "Sir?"
"There's that word again. Look, Mitchell, this isn't the easiest thing to say, and I’m not even sure you are the right person, but you and Sheppard…" O'Neill glanced up and waved his hand briefly. Cam didn't say anything. "Look, the bottom line is that there is something about this situation with Sheppard where he can only be rescued by his true love."
O'Neill dragged the last two words out. Cam just blinked.
==#==
[24 hours earlier]
John came into the gate room in Cheyenne Mountain wearing a borrowed tac vest and carrying a P90. Nothing felt quite right, but he'd at least managed to get extra Power Bars, even though McKay wasn't with him. It had become one of John's personal superstitions. Every soldier had a few. He was happy for the change of scene after three days of debriefing under the mountain, the only break an evening with Cam with a game, some beers and-- John shut the thought down immediately.
"Thanks for joining us, Colonel," Dr. Wells said.
John gave him a lopsided smile. "Always happy to play light switch while I’m in town."
"Sorry, sir." Dr. Wells blushed, a low flush rising under his thick, dark hair. John thought he looked more like a salesman than a scientist, but John had read their files. Wells was a biologist. Their leader, a Marine captain named Subramaniam, had a doctorate in mechanical engineering. They had an archeologist, a Dr. Geertz. Even Corporal Shane, their fourth and also a Marine, had a Master's in anthropology. This was the "follow it up" team, and they had no gene carriers on purpose, to keep from activating anything potentially deadly.
Captain Subramaniam stepped up and saluted John. "Thank you for joining us, sir."
"As you were, Captain," John said, returning the salute. "SG-17 is your crew. I'm just here to see if stuff will turn on. And I was getting a little stir crazy."
"Glad you could join us, sir."
John turned to Wells, who was studiously looking away. "So, tell me about this place we're going."
"We don't know much about it. SG-3 heard about it when they were visiting PX5-887. They didn't go in very far, but it looks like an Ancient facility built into a cliff side."
"We did an initial survey last week," Dr. Geertz said, reaching out with her hand. John shook it automatically, noting her accent and her Netherlands patch. Her hand felt small and calloused. "It looked pretty well stripped. The Goa'uld likely got there centuries ago, but we found evidence of something active."
Cpl. Shane stepped up and saluted, and John returned it. "We brought in Lt. Suarez last trip, sir. She's had the gene therapy, and she said it seemed like something big, but she couldn’t activate whatever it was."
"But the locals call it the Place of the Dragon," John said.
"Yes, sir," Subramaniam said. "There's the possibility of something weapon related. Otherwise Gen. O'Neill wouldn't have bothered you with this."
John knew all of this already, but he smiled anyway. "Sure thing."
He waited through the process of dialing the gate. It seemed kludgey, almost rickety, compared to the elegance of the Pegasus gates, but the splash of the wormhole opening was the same. Just as they stepped through, Wells leaned over and said, "They all look like Superman, there, but Geertz couldn't find a trace of Indus Valley or Vedic influence."
John wasn't sure what that meant, so he went with the easiest one. "Superman?"
"The captain. Even Shane thinks he's a bad ass."
John grinned as he looked around. The gate might not have had Atlantis’ soaring grace, but the feel of the transition had been exactly the same, and they had emerged on a platform at the edge of a city square that didn’t look quite like Pegasus, either. It reminded John to make no assumptions. Most Pegasus worlds were pastoral, and there were commonalities brought about by the centuries of life with Wraith. There were probably some similar trends here in response to the Goa'uld, but as yet, he didn't know how that would play out.
A crowd stopped momentarily to look at them, then went about their business as the team started down the steps. John hung back and let Subramaniam take the lead. A small delegation seemed to assemble from the crowd, and Subramaniam stepped forward to greet them.
"Hello again, captain," said a gray-haired woman with skin as brown as Subramaniam's. "We are pleased to see you again."
"Cayer Sinzi, we are pleased as well."
"So have you come to poke at the dragon again?" she asked.
John watched the half-dozen men and women standing behind Cayer Sinzi exchange looks. Subramaniam said, "If it wouldn't be too much trouble."
"You're no trouble," she said. "There are still people who think there may be treasure in that place, but none have ever found it. Sometimes someone gets lost, and doesn't come out. Don't get lost, Captain. But you've brought someone new? A new expert?"
Subramaniam nodded. "He has unique skills, and can sometimes see things where the Ancients have been."
The glances behind Cayer Sinzi started again. One man spoke. "And if you do find something, would it not belong to us?"
"We will take nothing without consulting you," Subramaniam said. Looks flew back and forth again.
===*===
Cam was the first one into the briefing room, and he placed his notepad at a place in the middle of the conference table at the far side from the door, but didn't sit. He was still trying to sort out whether he would be the right person for the job. He and Sheppard had messed around since flight school, but that had never stopped Cam from dating girls. Hell, he and Sheppard had double dated enough back then. He'd read Atlantis's AARs, and he knew that between the lines of a couple of them, there had to have been some hanky panky. If Sheppard had a true love, Cam figured it was the sky. As for Cam? He'd never let something like an unruly emotion get in the way of a good thing, never let himself notice his anticipation every time he knew Sheppard would be coming to Earth. And he certainly never let himself remember the elation, the heart-stopping joy when he found out Sheppard had survived. Again.
O'Neill walked in, and Cam straightened up. "At ease. We have a couple of minutes before everyone else gets here. Daniel's come up with some other official reason why it has to be you, but I worry about sending you in alone."
"Alone, sir?"
"You'll get the details in a minute, but the Benzedrine…"
Jackson's voice came from the door in a long-suffering tone. "That's Bendrinzi, Jack."
"Right," O'Neill said, but Cam could see the minute crinkle around his eyes. "The locals say that they don't have anything to do with it, that Sheppard must have woken the dragon, or some such, but they don't seem too broken up about it."
"Well, as we all surmised, it's likely that the trigger was Col. Sheppard's Ancient gene. At any rate, the Bendrinzi have legends," Jackson said. "All variations on a theme familiar to anyone who has read fairy tales on Earth. The one about the Place of the Dragon seems to be something of a blend of Snow White and the standard 'maiden in distress' legends, where the hero has to not only beat the dragon, but also be able kiss his true love and wake her up."
"But her is a him, in this case," O'Neill said, softly, glancing at Cam.
"Well, that's what makes this particular situation so strange. SG-17 tried to get back in, and we've also sent SG-2, but they encountered resistance that the Bendrinzi say they have never seen."
"Resistance?" Cam asked.
Jackson furrowed his eyebrows. "A dragon. Or at least it looks like a dragon--"
O'Neill cut in. "The part about breathing fire seems real. SG-2 nearly lost their eyebrows."
"Jack, it was worse than that for SG-17."
"So are you sending SG-1, sir?" Cam asked.
"Nope," O'Neill said. "Just you."
===#===
[24 hours earlier]
"Something about this looks familiar," John said.
Geertz nodded. "It's not unusual for Ancient facilities to seem similar. They were very modular builders."
"So do you feel anything, Colonel?" Subramaniam asked.
John nodded. It wasn't like Atlantis, but the corridors had lit up for him the same way. The sensation seemed deeper than the hum of awareness he always had of the Ancient city. If it were a tone, it would be a lower note. The corridors looked like Ancient architecture, but the rooms were empty, stripped bare, and in some places it was clear that equipment and consoles had been removed.
At a T junction he stopped and put his hands on the wall. The left seemed to be stronger. "Let's try this way." He turned down, trailing his fingers along the wall as he walked, and SG-17 followed behind. The sensation became stronger, almost the crackle he felt when he touched the gel interface on the city's control chair.
Ahead of him the corridor stopped, or rather the finish work of the Ancient interior stopped, but the corridor went on into bare rock. John motioned for SG-17 to wait, and stepped across the divide, still trailing his fingers.
The sensation amplified as his hand moved across the last of the archways, and John hesitated. There was something there, something long dormant, and he could feel it rapidly powering up. John placed his hand flat and concentrated, trying to figure out what it was, and then noise and red light erupted behind him, throwing him forward on to the rock. He landed hard on his P90, rolled to bring it up, and found himself part way over a ledge. He scrambled for purchase, feeling the rock cut into his palms, his weapon digging into his ribs, as he hauled himself back up. He lay, panting with effort and shock, and looked down the way he had come.
The corridor was dark. The lights that had come on when he entered the complex were off, and as he watched, he saw three lights snap on from SG-17's P90s. He heard a voice calling, "Col. Sheppard, are you okay?"
"Fine," he said, pushing himself to sit, and snapping on his own light. "What about you? Who's down?"
"Roll call," one voice said. John couldn't tell if it was Shane or Wells, but the American accent meant it wasn't Subramaniam, and male meant it wasn't Geertz. She responded first with her name, then Wells.
"Shane here. Superman's down. Wells?"
"I'm on it."
John watched as they used their lights to find the body, and listened as their medic, Wells, went through an assessment. Someone brought out a better flashlight, but John couldn't see well. He heard low curses, and then Geertz said, "I can field dress some of this, but he needs the infirmary."
"That wasn't a normal explosion," John said. "I don't smell anything, and my hearing is fine."
"It was red, sir," Shane said, "and it breathed fire."
"Place of the Dragon," Wells muttered.
"Well, let's get out of here," John said, pushing himself to his feet.
"We'll need to rig some way to carry him that doesn't put any pressure on these burns," Geertz said.
"I have an idea," John said, walking toward them. As soon as he reached the dividing line between the rock and the corridor, it filled with red light, a hologram he could not see through, patterned and writhing. He stepped back immediately. The light became translucent, but did not disappear. John stepped forward again, and it seemed to solidify. He picked up a stone and tossed it, low and toward the inside wall where it wouldn't hit anyone from SG-17.
It bounced back.
John stepped back again until he could see through the red light. "Looks like I'm stuck here. I just tried to get a rock through, and no dice."
"Let me try," Shane said. John could see him reach into his tac vest and throw something at the red light, but it bounced with a flash. Shane stepped forward to pick it up. "Huh. Fried granola bar."
John saw a brighter light, yellow and blue, forming in the shifting red glow. "Back off!" he yelled. When Shane retreated, the light went away. "Fire breathing force field," he said. "Great. Get Subramanian out of here."
"I'll stay with you, sir," Geertz said.
"I think it's going to take all three of you to carry him and your packs back to the gate. I'll be fine, doctor."
"Sir?" Shane said.
"That's an order. Take care of the captain, and tell 'em to send someone back for me."
===-===
"Just me." Cam said. It wasn't really a question.
"According to the legend," Jackson began, but O'Neill cut him off.
"Let him get the expurgated version with everyone else. You can give him the full version before he goes through," he said softly, his eyes moving toward the door and back. Cam glanced up to see several other people come in. "Let's get started, everyone." Cam looked around to see most of SG-17 and SG-2 walk in and take seats. They looked strained, and SG-17 was missing Captain Subramanian. "How's Superman doing?" O'Neill asked, sitting at the head of the table.
Wells' lips quirked at hearing the general use their team nickname. "He'll recover, sir. Dr. Lam says he'll be out of the field for a month to let the burns heal."
"Not everyone gets to say they've been benched by a dragon," O'Neill said. "Now how about you tell us how you managed to lose the military commander of Atlantis."
Cam listened to the story, how the thing had appeared when Sheppard stepped from the finished corridor to the rock, how he couldn't get through, and how the force field spat fire at them, how they carried out Subramaniam using their packs to make a sling to carry him, and how they tried to go back to Sheppard, only to find a holographic dragon spewing more fire at them from the opening to the facility.
O'Neill looked over at Tsien, the leader of SG-2. "We saw the dragon, too, sir. It looked like something from a movie, and we only missed getting burned thanks to SG-17's warning. We can't get into the complex." He gestured with a remote toward a screen, and it filled with the scene of an opening in the hill side, Tsien walking cautiously toward it, and an unmistakable shape forming inside the doorway. Flames, searingly bright, shot out, barely missing Tsien as he turned to run.
Cpl. Shane said, "We dialed out to send Geertz and Capt. Subramaniam home, and Cayer Sinzi--she's like a council head or business leader--"
"Cayer is an honorific?" Jackson asked.
"Um, yes, sir. She asked us what happened. When we told her about the dragon, she didn't believe us, so I asked her about the legend. She said once the dragon woke up, only a true hero could enter. And, um," Shane blushed, but held his face immobile. "Only true love could rescue whoever was trapped inside."
O'Neill didn't look at Cam. He looked at Jackson, who cleared his throat. "Dr. Jamerson from SG-2 has briefed me on the version of the legend they heard from this Cayer Sinzi, but it looks like the Bendrinzi may have conflated two different story threads. My guess is that the part of the legend that speaks to the hero is probably the more accurate one to use in our decision making. You see, almost every time there's some element of needing a true love in this kind of lore, the person to be rescued is in some kind of magically induced sleep. Col. Sheppard was clearly awake and fine when you left him, so I think the better arc here is the hero arc."
"How does that help us? What kind of hero are we talking about?" Cam asked.
"Well, this outpost is Ancient, and you may remember that you pulled the sword from the stone in Avalon."
"That was a long time ago, and there are other people in this room who have managed to save Earth's bacon a time or two."
Jackson said, "And that would be conflating legends as well--the Arthurian and the fairy tale. Dragon slaying is pretty common, especially to rescue the damsel in distress, but they both come out of the chivalric tradition. What?" Jackson looked up at Cam, who had his eyebrows up a fraction.
"Damsel in distress?" Cam said. "That's not exactly how I'd ever picture Col. Sheppard." He was trying very hard not to picture what he'd done to Sheppard the night before.
"Let's not let that characterization leave this room," O'Neill said. "In fact, let's not discuss the particulars of this situation at all." He looked pointedly at SG-17.
Jackson looked at Cam. "I'll send you a reading list of the relevant folk tales. There may be something there. You should at least know the general motifs. I'll email them to you. It will take you less than an hour."
"And I'd like you ready to go in two," O'Neill put in. "Dismissed."
===+===
Sheppard tried to find a way to get comfortable on the cavern floor. His hips and back were already stiff. Once SG-17 had left, the red glow had remained, settling back to an ever-shifting, but steady light. He was grateful for the illumination, because the wide ledge on which he lay dropped off, and the rock he'd sent down had taken seven seconds to hit something before clattering even further down.
No one had come within the first few hours, which meant that no one could get to him. Yet, he reminded himself. It had been 14 hours according to his watch, and he didn't have much food beyond his lucky Power Bars. He resolved to let himself have two a day, but he might have to go down to one to make it last. At least there was water, bitter and sulfurous but drinkable, trickling down one of the rock faces.
Every time he approached the archway and the light, he could see the white heat begin to form in the middle. He'd been too slow backing off once, and the arm of his jacket was singed. With nothing else to do, he let his mind wander back to the night before this mission, to Cam. They'd never done anything like that. Hell, they'd rarely ever taken their time. John pulled himself out of the memory; the last thing he wanted or needed right this minute was his body's response, and the last thing he wanted to think about was how that night had made him feel.
SG-17 would have come back for him if they could. He knew that. He knew that even now, the people under the mountain would do the same things that he would do in his city. They would not leave him behind.
===-===
Cam stepped through the 'gate alone, feeling like the lone son sent out to seek his fortune. He snorted at the analogy. Better to be the knight on a quest. Jackson's last-minute list of things to remember echoed in his ear, but was soon drowned out by the sound of voices, hooves, and wheels on stone. The Bendrinzi city was pretty much what he expected from SG-17 and SG-2's reports, and he started down the steps of the dais, looking around for the woman they'd described. A small delegation walked toward him, led by a gray-haired woman in a dark dress. "Cayer Sinzi?" he asked.
"I am she. You are the hero and true love?" she said, her eyebrows rising. "We expected a woman."
"Col. Cameron Mitchell, ma'am. I'm all we got at the moment."
"You look no different than the others. What makes you think the dragon will let you pass?"
"Not sure it will."
"I see." She looked at him and seemed to come to a decision. "Well, we will not send you alone. In fact, we will take you to the Place of the Dragon, and one of us will accompany you, if you can get past the dragon."
"If you don't mind my saying, you seem pretty relaxed about this, ma'am."
Her mouth tightened like Sam suppressing a smile. "I am not at all relaxed. A legend we ceased to believe in comes true? Now we wonder if the legends of treasure are also true."
"Treasure?" Cam asked. The other people with her shifted slightly, and Cam looked at them. They were mostly the kind of people he was used to at these things--mixed ages, better dressed than most of the people around them. The youngest was a man with long black hair, styled in careful, shining waves.
He noticed Cam looking at him and spoke. "The legends say a dragon guards treasure, but we have never found it. We had an agreement with your other friends to share anything you find."
"I'm sure we'll honor that. Right now I'm just worried about Col. Sheppard," Cam said. "Cameron Mitchell. I didn't catch your name?"
"I am Cayer Elzin." The man didn't offer a hand or make any other gesture, so Cam didn't either. They walked to the edge of the city without talking. There were carriages waiting for them, drawn by something between a camel and a horse. Elzin maneuvered Cam into one with two of the other younger people. He introduced them, but Cam didn't remember their names. "We could walk, but Cayer Sinzi is older than she lets on," Elzin said, sharing a conspiratorial and pitying look with the other two Brendrinzi. Cam noticed there was an empty wagon accompanying them. This question of treasure was more important to the Bendrinzi than he thought, and maybe the carriages were a cover for taking the wagon.
"Tell me about the legend," Cam said. "I'd like to know what I'm getting into."
"I can't do justice to the full story," Elzin said. "It's an epic with many heroic deeds even before Shinzan is trapped by the dragon."
One of the others spoke up, his voice light and sarcastic. "There to stay until a hero and his true love should come."
The Bendrinzi chuckled, and Elzin said, "We just didn't expect them to be the same person. In the story there are two."
"Yeah, I get that," Cam said, feeling his jaw tighten and his face heat up. "I wouldn't say I'm Col. Sheppard's true love."
"Then we'll see if the dragon even lets you enter the cave. Shinzan was only released after Sinzi solved the riddles and beat the dragon."
"Sinzi?" Cam asked. "Not Cayer Sinzi."
Elzin and his friends chuckled. "No, of course not. She's named after her."
"So there were two? Sinzi and another hero?"
"The hero is never named. Some think that Sinzi was both," Elzin glanced around at the other men riding with them, and they smirked, "but the legends say that the hero slew the dragon."
Jackson had told him to learn all he could about the legends. Even though he'd read the report, Cam asked, "So what were the riddles?"
"Let me think," Elzin said. "Ah. How about this one?" He spoke the words in rhythm. "High as a ha'tak, weak as a twig, it starts out small and grows so big. It fills a tel'tak, or a town. You cannot catch or pull it down."
Cam had no idea. That one wasn't in SG-2's report. "Can you say that again?" he asked, and Elzin repeated the rhyme. Cam remembered that these were likely to map onto fairy tale riddles and rhymes from Earth. It hit him. "A hill full, a hole full, and nary catch a bowl full!" He grinned. "Smoke!"
"Perhaps you'll get through after all."
"What else is there?" Cam asked.
"More than riddles. Trials and sacrifices, too. In one version she has to pull as many hairs from her head as days they've been apart, and burn them in order to see him. In another version she gives up a day."
Cam had heard about giving up a day, but not the bit about the hair. It seemed trivial. Maybe the trick was just getting in the door. The ride was getting bumpier, and Cam wished he could just walk, since they weren't going that fast, but there didn't seem to be any way he could do it without being rude. The bumps seemed to stop the conversation, and Cam thought Elzin looked a little green around the gills.
The carriage and wagon stopped next to a low hill. An opening had been excavated, and Cam could see the edges of metal, Ancient design apparent even in this small piece. They stepped down and Cam walked toward the opening, stopping about fifty feet away. Cayer Sinzi stepped up beside him, standing a bit close. They had their backs to the rest of the company. "Take this," she said softly, opening her hand to reveal an object of gold. It looked for all the world like a wide-toothed comb, but just small enough for her to have hidden it in her hand. "My family has passed it down for years to the eldest daughter. We claim descent from Sinzi herself. If it doesn’t help you, I'd like it back."
Cam wasn't sure if he could ask anything, so he placed his hand over hers, and palmed the comb. "Thank you," he said. He wasn't sure what to think about it, but Jackson's dictum to be on the look out for help from old women was still ringing in his ears. "I guess now we'll find out if I can even get in the door." He didn't let himself think about Sheppard.
"Good luck," Cayer Sinzi said. She nodded to Elzin, who followed behind Cam.
Cam walked at a deliberate pace, hoping to have some warning if the dragon showed up breathing fire. He remembered the video of Tsien, and marked about the spot Tsien had reached when the dragon head had appeared. He paused. Nothing happened. He stepped closer, and something red began to form, with nostrils the size of basketballs and teeth as long as baseball bats. Deeper in Cam could see a dark glitter of eyes.
There was no fire, so he took a step forward, and then another one. The dragon looked solid, and the glittering eyes moved. Cam walked steadily forward, hearing murmuring behind him as people realized that the fire had not come. He watched the head, looking for any change and ready to dive to the side, and stopped just at the edge of the cave. The grass under his boots was singed, and he could smell old soot, but it seemed that the flames would not appear. He took a breath, tightened his grip around the comb, and stepped inside the doorway.
He was inches from dragon's head, and he jumped back when a forked tongue escaped from its mouth. Instead of being licked, Cam found that the tongue was not solid, and it ran up and down once, for all the world like some kind of scanning beam. Then the dragon winked out, as if it had never been there.
Cam snapped the light on, and let it play down the corridor. There was nothing that looked like a projector, and no evidence that a real dragon had ever been there. He glanced back to see his Bendrinzi escort watching. He gave them a thumbs up, hoping it didn't mean anything rude in their culture, and turned down the hall. "Sheppard!" he yelled, but there was no response. He wasn't surprised. SG-17 had said that he was trapped fairly deep in the complex.
Behind him there was suddenly noise and light. Elzin had tried to follow him in, and the dragon had formed again. Cam could see through it, the view of the waiting Bendrinzi tinged with the red of the dragon's scales. He could see the flames when they formed, and Elzin running backwards and away, but he couldn't tell what was making the image or the fire.
===-===
John sat with his arms crossed over his knees, and his head on his arms. It had been boring for the last however many hours, and he'd slept badly, sitting up, his ass falling asleep against the cold rock. Something besides discomfort had woken him, though. There was a sound, like a low hum, and the space between the archway leading from the cave where he sat to the corridors of the installation now glowed blue.
He levered himself to his feet and walked cautiously toward the arch, inching passing the point where the red glow had begun to form fire. As he got nearer, he realized it was an image, somewhat hazy, looking out a similar archway to a clear day. The figure in the middle was Cam, and behind him John could see a small group of people dressed in Brendrinzi clothing. If this was showing him the entrance, then it meant Cam was coming to get him. But why was he alone?
John watched Cam come down the corridor, his figure growing as if he were approaching whatever camera-like thing was taking the image, until he stopped. For a moment it seemed as if Cam were looking right at him, but Cam kept looking around as if trying to find something. John reached out without thinking, calling Cam's name, but his fingers stuttered on the force field, and Cam did not react to the sound. John stepped back and watched, his chest tightening, adrenaline rising in a way that seemed different. He'd been rescued before; he knew the feeling of anticipation. This held some of that, but it was different. It was Cam.
Hours on his own to think, to remember how that last night had felt, hours to realize just how screwed he was if this was a one-way thing, and Cam was still just on the fuck buddy page. Hours to figure that he was going back to Atlantis when he made it out of here, and it wouldn't matter either way.
Cam's image reached out, and John did too, hesitating at first. He knew it wasn't real, and didn't want to deal with the feelings that washed up, the sheer want—not lust, not sex, but just the touch of Cam's hand. He let his fingers rest against the image of Cam's, and drew a breath. Cam stepped back suddenly, withdrawing his hand, blinked, and then stepped forward, disappearing like a ghost at the edge of the archway.
John stepped back. It had to be real. Cam was here, and coming to find him.
===-===
The force field had looked like a mirror, throwing back a slightly-distorted image as if it were a projection, but it moved when he did. Cam reached out and touched it, and a moment later his image disappeared, replaced by John, reaching out toward him. Their fingers would have met but the image lasted only an instant before the force field went down. Cam stepped back and blinked before moving forward. The look on Sheppard's face had been unguarded, hope mixed with what might have been longing. But Cam was probably fooling himself with that last bit. Sheppard wasn't the type to pine after anyone, and that last night was the first time he'd ever felt like he'd gotten under the hood of that bug-crazy brain.
Cam stepped through the arch where the force field had been, continuing down the corridor of the Ancient outpost. It had been stripped of anything of obvious use, probably centuries or millennia ago. But something was still operating, making the dragon's head and this strange force field.
Wherever John was in this complex, it had looked different in that flash of image. Shane and Wells from SG-17 said John had walked into an area that was bare rock, and Cam had seen something like a cave behind John. The corridor reached a T-junction. Left or right? A thought came unbidden: Follow your heart. The heart was on the left of the body, so Cam turned left, not thinking about what that meant. At any rate, so far this was a lot easier than Avalon had been. No holographic knights.
The corridor opened to a larger room, about three stories high, and easily as wide. As soon as he crossed the threshold there was light, and it coalesced into the form of a giant wearing a tunic with a belt that looked like it was made of bark and carrying Paul Bunyon’s axe. "Spoke too soon," he muttered. The giant looked as much like a storybook figure as the damn knight in Avalon, but Cam assumed it was potentially just as lethal.
"You will not pass," the giant rumbled. His voice was oddly conversational.
Cam thought back to the reading Jackson had given him. Sometimes it was better to fight, and sometimes to trick. He couldn't see any way to trick the giant; the room was bare and he doubted a flash-bang would have any effect. Cayer Elzin and Jackson both had mentioned riddles. "What if I win my way across?"
"How would you do that?" the giant asked, resting his axe on his shoulder.
"How about a riddle?" Cam said. He felt foolish. He resolved never to tell anyone, especially John, if they came out of this, or some joker would start to call him Bilbo.
"Hoom," the Giant said. "A riddle. That's traditional, I suppose. How about this one? I have rivers without water, forests without trees, mountains without rocks, and towns without houses. What am I?"
Cam thought for a minute. This one sounded familiar. "A map!" he said, and added softly, "The map is not the territory."
"No, it is not, and yes that is correct," the giant rumbled. "I suppose you may pass. You're probably clever enough to get yourself through the rest of this."
"Thank you kindly, sir," Cam said. He stepped into the room. The giant stepped aside, and Cam could clearly see the hallway continuing. He set off across the room, but before he could get to the archway, the giant moved, and placed the axe across the doorway. It covered half of it, and there was no way Cam could get through. "Going back on our deal?"
"No, just a final thought. Another riddle." The giant rumbled a sing-song rhyme: "When I hold your true love, you cannot see me. When you look into my face, I shall never lie. When you are not here, I am empty. I will tell you the truths you cannot deny."
"Do you need an answer?" Cam was pretty sure he knew it.
"No. Call it a warning."
"Can I ask you something?"
"A riddle for me?"
"No, just a question. This place was stripped centuries ago. How come you and the dragon are still here?"
"But I am not here," the giant said. With that he was gone, but the sound of a slide and a slam startled Cam. Telling himself sternly that he was unlikely to encounter a bridge troll in a building, he walked toward the noise, not surprised when the corridor opened into another room. This one looked obviously stripped, clear where Ancient machines and consoles once stood or were embedded in the walls. This room opened out to the left, so that you could walk along the wall and never venture into the work area, but the archway directly across was closed by a door. Marks on the floor indicated that perhaps a railing had once stood here.
He remembered Jackson talking about how some fairy tales said you should never leave the path, but he hadn't had any indication here. It seemed worth checking out, even if it meant walking the perimeter of the room and continuing on. One section of the wall had pry marks, as if someone had thought there was something underneath. Cam reached out to run his fingers over it the edges of the panel, because couldn't see anything that indicated why it would be special.
As soon as he touched it writing appeared. It was Ancient, and he couldn't read it. It faded quickly, so Cam took out a digital camera, touched the edge again and recorded the image for Jackson to read later.
He spent the next twenty minutes working on the door and trying to raise Sheppard on the radio. Eventually he kicked at the door in his frustration and gave up. He had a feeling the writing that appeared would tell him how to get through, but he'd never been able to pick up much Ancient. He turned and went down the hall, jogging back the way he'd come, hesitating at the giant's room, but it didn't appear when he stepped inside, so he ran across and out to the small crowd of Bendrinzi.
"Sorry folks. I need a little something from back home."
===-===
John was bored. The sight of Cam in the archway's force field had given him hope, and he had spent the next hour expecting to see or hear from him. His radio was almost out of charge, so he turned it off again. He should have known it wouldn't be easy. Once Cam disappeared the force field had gone red again, the white heat starting to form in the center, so John backed off.
He tried playing prime/not prime with himself, but that wasn't near as distracting as playing it with McKay. He'd know the answer as soon as he thought of a number. That led him to thinking about McKay, about Atlantis, and wondering what the IOA was planning to do with the leadership. He was really worried that they'd try to bring the city back to the Milky Way galaxy for good, but John would turn traitor before he'd let that happen.
He spent the next three hours working out scenarios for defending the city against infiltration, and trying not to think about Cam at all.
===-===
Cam strode down the gate ramp.
"You're back early," Sgt. Harriman said.
"Not here for long," Cam groused. "I need Jackson."
===-===
John's stomach grumbled, and he appreciated the distraction. It had been four hours since he last ate, so he unwrapped a Power Bar and bit off a small piece. One trick to surviving on less was to convince your stomach it was more. There had been lectures in survival school about how your brain decided you'd had enough to eat, and the time spent eating was part of it. He needed to make the Power Bar last 20 minutes, if he could. Tall order. He monitored how slowly he chewed, trying not to let anything distract him.
It was like trying not to think about a white horse, or a bear, or whatever that Russian thing was. As soon as he realized he didn't want to think about Cam, he couldn't help it. Thinking about Cam made him swallow faster than he'd intended.
Cam backed him up to the kitchen counter, and took the bottle out of his hand. "I hit the record button on the game," he said, taking a swig and setting the bottle aside. "We don't get to do this often, so I didn't want to waste any of it." He leaned in to kiss John on the neck, and John felt the rasp of his tongue over the stubble, cool at first from the beer, but warming rapidly. His breath hitched. No one touched him on Atlantis beyond manly thumps on his shoulder, or Teyla's hands gentle on his arms as they touched foreheads, or sometimes McKay, grabbing him by the arm to lead him toward whatever thing he found exciting at the moment. Cam's lips on his neck, his wet tongue, they captured John's total attention until Cam pressed the cold beer bottle on to the opposite side of his neck.
John hissed at the feel of it, then a moan escaped him as Cam replaced the bottle with his mouth, switching sides and moving up to take John's ear between his teeth, biting a bit too hard, and not hard enough. John heard the sound of the bottle against the counter, and Cams hands were on his shirt, undoing the buttons of the worn oxford, one set of fingers warm, the other cool from holding the beer bottle. John braced himself against the counter, giving in to the sensations of Cam's mouth, now in the hollow of his collarbone, and his fingers, now moving the shirt aside.
Cam pulled back, reached for the bottle, and ran the edge of the base around John's nipple, leaving it wet with the sweat on the bottle and tight from the cold. He moved the bottle to the other side, leaning down to put his mouth over the first nipple, and John drew breath, feeling himself tight in his jeans. "Damn fly boys," he said, his voice rough in his ears. "Zero to sixty in six point two seconds."
"Takes one to know one," Cam said into John's chest. He pulled John's nipple gently in his teeth before straightening up to lean in, their hips close, the bottle between them, still. "Besides, I think that was about a minute and a half."
"Who's counting?"
"I was trying to drag it out, since we have all night. 'Course I could just drop to my knees right now."
John swallowed, and then blew out his breath with a slight shake of his head. He slid his hand up Cam's back, under the T-shirt, feeling the warmth and the muscle under his splayed fingers. "No objections."
"You know what I want to do to you, Sheppard? I want to make you make noise. You are just too damn quiet."
John let Cam lead him to the bedroom, strip him, believing him when he said, "Just trust me here." His brain stuttered when Cam wrapped John's wrist in a bandana, and tied to the headboard. "You okay?" John nodded, and Cam went for the other wrist, but he could feel himself tensing with each knotted cloth. When Cam pulled out the belt to tie his left ankle, John felt himself locking his knee.
"Don't you worry," Cam said, sliding his hand up and down John's leg, trying to gentle him. "I mean to get you out of that head of yours, that's all. My turn to drive the bus."
"What's that mean?"
"Someone gave you bad habits, son, and I aim to teach you a lesson."
"Mitchell, what the…" John started, pulling at the bandanas around his wrists, but letting Cam position his leg. He'd rarely heard Cam drop into that corn-pone rhythm when he was sober, and he was pretty sure Cam was sober.
Cam looked up, seemingly satisfied with the belt on John's right ankle. "You, my friend, are of the wham, bam, and thank you ma'am school. In this case it's thank you, sir, but that's not the point here."
"What is the point?"
Cam moved up and sat next to John, leaning over on his arm and looking directly into John's face, and he wanted to look away from the intense stare, but he couldn't. He tried to relax his arms and legs, but his core was tight, his glutes clenched and resistant. Cam's eyes glanced down at John's chest when his pectorals moved, John's tension skating through them. Cam looked back, into John's eyes. "The point is we're not in some store room, or back room, or out behind the bleachers, making sure we don't get caught. We have time."
Cam leaned down and licked across John's nipple, then blew. John drew breath at the shock. Pushing 40, and no one had ever done this to him. The next thing he felt was Cam's lips on his mouth, barely touching, and then the warmth of Cam's tongue, tracing a gentle path across John's lower lip. John reached up, but Cam backed off, moving to the other nipple, wetting it and blowing gently, and suddenly John knew the true meaning of zero-to-sixty.
Cam teased back and forth between John's mouth and his chest, nosing through John's thick hair, using his tongue and breath until John was arching off the bed, seeking more sensation, huffing out his breath in want.
He felt Cam sit back, felt the rough, wide palm over his pectorals, fingers tracing up John's neck to swirl lightly, gun callouses catching, around the edges of his ears. John caught his breath, turned toward Cam's hand, and Cam placed his palm gently on John's cheek. "Now you see?" Cam said, his voice soft, husky, amused. "That's what I'm talking about."
John lost track of time, lost track of how many times Cam took him to the edge with his fingers, his mouth, and even, finally, with the friction of his belly as he lay over John working his nipples with his teeth and tongue. Cam lifted himself on his arms, looking down at John's hips where they were arching up, cock straining and seeking touch, any touch. Cam moved up, and brought his lips to John's, gently and first, then softly nipping, then lowering his body with their hips together, kissing John deeply. John could barely move his head, and he found he didn't want to. He let himself feel Cam's mouth, Cam's tongue, and the length of Cam's cock next to his own. John started to move his hips, but when he did Cam pushed himself up on his arms. "Not yet. Not quite yet." He leaned in to kiss John again, touching only at the lips and tongue, and John wasn't sure he'd ever been kissed quite like that, with the laser focus of a fighter pilot on a mission.
From the kiss alone he was breathless again. Cam pulled back with a nip at John's lower lip, and looked down. John met his gaze and tried, wordlessly to plead with him for more. Cam's lazy smile crooked half his mouth. "What do you need, buddy?"
John couldn't have answered in words if he'd been offered a new ZPM and a full payload of drones. He wanted to come, desperately, but he didn't know what he needed. He slid his fingers under the headboard and gripped it as tight as the bindings allowed, arcing his whole body up and pulling at the restraints on his ankles. Cam moved to sit beside him, and gentling hand on his chest. "Easy." In contrast to his words, he skated his fingers down John's belly, under his cock, which was so hard it was jutting out and away from his body so that Cam's fingers didn't even brush it. Cam barely touched the base of John's cock before moving back up, and as Cam's hand moved back, John let out a frustrated groan.
Cam's smile spread over his face. "Yeah?" he said. "Tell me about it." But John had no words, and only the sounds of need came out of his throat. Cam shifted position, ran his hand firmly down John's body, and up around the root of his cock. John panted, a soft noise with every breath, and when he felt the wet heat of Cam's mouth, the slide of his tongue, John cried out.
Cam backed off, and John groaned at the loss, at the cool contrast of the air, and barely heard Cam say, "Got ya," before he descended to take John in his mouth again, sliding to take him deep, working him with his fist, and, this time, not backing off when John got close. Orgasm hit John like a jolt to six Gs, an almost inside-out explosion that lasted and lasted, every ejaculation feeling like it came from his center, tapering off finally to a satisfying emptiness. Cam held himself still as John came down, eventually moving his hand to cup John's balls and slowly pull his mouth off John's cock.
John hissed with the feeling of too much sensation, but Cam was careful. He stood next to the bed, and leaned over to kiss John softly. John smelled and tasted his own semen on Cam's breath, and it felt like a gift.
Cam untied him, moving John's arms down to his sides and rubbing the shoulders. The belt had left a chafe mark on John's right ankle, and Cam smoothed his thumb over it, before climbing into the bed. John moved over to make room, but Cam moved in close, his head on John's shoulder and a leg slung over John's hips. John didn't know what to say, so he said, "Wow."
He could feel the huff of Cam's laughing breath, and feel the shake of his shoulders. "Yeah, I don't think they heard you at the Mountain."
"That loud?"
"Oh, yeah." John could feel Cam's smile, followed by a kiss on the piece of skin closest to Cam's mouth. "Told you I was going to get you to make noise." John felt himself flushing, embarrassed. "So you liked that, huh?"
"Yeah," John breathed. "Wow." It had been the most intense sexual experience of his life. There wasn't any other way to describe it. "What can I…?" He started. He didn't think he had it in him, and certainly not right now, to do the same thing to Cam. All he really wanted was to go to sleep, but he wouldn't do that until he'd given at least something back to Cam.
"Give it a minute," Cam said, and they lay still for a few long minutes, and John started to doze off. "Okay," Cam said, rolling onto his back. "I'd really like you to suck me, slow and easy."
John sat up and ran his hands across Cam's chest, stopping to play with his nipples and leaning in to use his mouth, which he'd never done before, but Cam pushed his head down. "Don't wake up too much. Just easy, slow." John slid down and took Cam's half-hard cock into his mouth, and sucked gently, moving his tongue as Cam swelled, adding his hand and making sure it was spit slick. His head rested on Cam's belly half the time.
It was slow, and it was easy, and John found himself paying attention to the texture of Cam in his mouth, the hitching of his breath when John pulled back and ran his tongue across and over, the feeling of the veins under his fingers. Blowjobs had always been about efficiency before, rushing to get their rocks off in stolen moments. Now it became as much about his own enjoyment as Cam's.
Cam finally started canting his hips, looking for more. John didn't draw it out; he gave Cam what he wanted, and he paid attention to every noise, every pulse, the trembling of Cam's belly under his cheek. And when Cam came, he felt the pulses on his tongue, and tasted, and swallowed, feeling for the first time that it wasn't just an act of expediency, but a sharing of self.
John backed off, feeling Cam twitch under him, hypersensitive, but he stayed where he was, his head now just below Cam's sternum, listening to his heartbeat slowing. John was overwhelmed, trying not to tremble. Cam's fingers carded through his hair. "Hey," Cam said. "You okay?"
John nodded against him, comfortable in the lie, and Cam pulled at his shoulder until he moved to put his head on the pillow, next to Cam's. Cam looked at him. "See what I mean about taking your time?" John nodded, closing his eyes to hide, and pretending to be so tired as to fall asleep almost immediately. He didn't think Cam bought it for a minute.
===-===
Jackson downloaded the photos from Cam's camera, and opened them to fill the monitor. "Oh, this is straightforward Ancient. This is easy." Cam relaxed a fraction as Jackson put his finger to the screen and read out the lines in English.
"I offer this my sacrifice
"For him most precious in my eyes;
"Let him always be with me,
"That both may live if one might die."
"What does that mean?" Cam asked.
"I... I have no idea. I'm actually surprised that it rhymes in English." Jackson furrowed his brow, reaching automatically for his coffee cup. "Well, the last one's more of an assonance."
"Whatever. What do I do with this?"
"So tell me what happened before you got to this."
Cam told him about the dragon letting him pass and the giant's riddle, then how the panel had looked, and how it had lit up with the words when he touched it.
"Okay, so for some reason the Dragon lets you pass. I'm not sure what trial that is, but maybe you smell like Sheppard, or something."
"The tongue was like a scanner. It went through me."
"Huh. Did you draw a weapon on the giant?"
"No, just answered his riddle."
"So it was probably checking to see if you were like John in some way, and you'd both just come from Earth, so your chemical signatures were probably similar enough. The giant is usually a test for violence, for knowing when to use your wits or your sword, or—" Jackson gestured at Cam, "or your firearm. Point being that these are tests, and this next one is whether or not you read Ancient."
"I don't read Ancient."
"Let me give you the phonetics." Jackson shrunk the window with the photograph from the complex on PX5-887 and opened a text editor next to it, rapidly typing what looked like gibberish to Cam. He printed the page, and handed it over. "Try pronouncing that."
Cam gave it a go, and Jackson corrected him in several places. Then he made Cam practice it ten more times. He called down to the gate room telling them to prepare to send Cam back. "They've got a scheduled return," Jackson said, hanging up the phone, "and then you can go. Let's stop by the mess hall and make sure you have food in you."
Cam raised an eyebrow at him. "Since when do you notice needing to eat?"
Jackson looked confused. "It's good mission practice, isn't it?"
Cam let it slide. It was a good idea. Jackson got coffee while Cam filled his canteen and grabbed a couple of muffins, eating them as they walked. When they reached the gate room, SG4 was just coming in. The wormhole winked out, and then at a signal from Jackson to the control booth, the gate began to turn and dial PX5-887. "Try it again," Jackson said.
"Yeah, or I might accidentally tell them I'm there to massage their fish."
"What? Oh, right," Jackson said. "Just try it again, and don't forget the rising tone on sia."
Cam read the lines, pitching his voice so that only Jackson could hear, feeling like he almost had them memorized, and not wanting to think about what they meant. John Sheppard was pretty damn precious in Cam's eyes, even if the man didn't know it. Although how he could miss it after that last night, Cam wasn't sure. There was no telling what Sheppard really thought about anything, but Cam remembered the way he looked, spread out on Cam's bed and opening himself up to trust, to sensation. That sight was rare enough to be called precious, at the very least.
Cam took a breath. Jackson nodded, clapping him on the shoulder, as if he'd been reading Cam's mind.
===-===
John let his head fall back hard enough to hurt when it hit the rock. He really needed a distraction, because if he let himself remember what Cam had done and made him feel, he was going to start mooning over the man like a puppy. He knew what they had, and it was convenient and easy for both of them. No way did John want to ruin it.
He stood up and walked toward the red glow again, stopping just as the center turned the yellow-white that signaled fire. There had to be some way to use that to get out of here. He wished he had McKay with him. Hell, he wished he had his team with him. They'd find a way out, or a way to communicate, and they'd keep him distracted from all this damn thinking.
And where was anybody. SGC didn't leave people behind. If they weren't here, they couldn't get here. He was stuck.
===-===
Cam went from the gate to the Ancient outpost after the barest of pleasantries. He jogged down the corridor, hesitating when he reached the giant's room. It appeared again, and the conversation ran the same, but the riddle was the second one he had posed before. "When I hold your true love, you cannot see me. When you look into my face, I shall never lie. When you are not here, I am empty. I will tell you the truths you cannot deny." The giant hefted his axe." Do you have the answer to my riddle?"
Cam gave him a grin he did not feel. "Sure. It's a mirror."
"You may not like what it tells you," the giant said. "You may pass."
But as before, the giant stopped him before he could leave. "What does a star see never, a king see rarely, but most see every day?"
Cam didn't know this one. "You got me."
"I should not let you pass, then, if you do not know."
"Seriously?"
"Yes, but you answered the riddle," the giant rumbled. "By the rules I must let you pass." He vanished. Cam glanced around, but he couldn't see any projectors. He turned and trotted down the corridor to the room with the panel. He read out the phonetic Ancient, but nothing happened. He reached to run his finger along the edge, and the Ancient letters reappeared, glowing and suspended in the air just in front of the panel. Cam pulled out the paper from Jackson, and sounded out the ancient rhyme, thinking about the meaning, in case there was some mental component. He didn't put anything past the Ancients, and he wondered what kind of sacrifice he would have to make.
The panel slid up, revealing a workstation untouched by the years. A small window opened, and a small tray slid out. Cam had no idea what to do. If it wanted a sacrifice, it wasn't a big one. He didn't have any jewelry. Everything he carried was utilitarian. Then he remembered Elzin's story about the hero having to sacrifice a hair for every day since she'd seen her true love. Cam figured it had been about a day and a half by this point, but his hair was short, and he didn't think the machine would know that. He reached up and grabbed a few strands, putting them in the tray. It immediately slid back into the wall, and the panel came down. Nothing else happened, and when Cam reached out to the edge, the words did not appear again. "Damnit!" Whatever this test was about, he couldn't fail now.
He heard a low machine sound from behind the panel, and then silence. He clicked his radio, calling for Sheppard, but there was no answer. Cam walked over to the closed door. "Come on," he said, placing his palm flat on the cool metal. He hoped Sheppard was okay. He wanted, he hoped... Let him always be with me, the rhyme had said. Cam knew that wasn't possible, given their duties, but you could be with someone, be partners. Cam swallowed. That was probably six steps ahead of where Sheppard was. Best not to think about it, and focus on the mission. The problem was that Sheppard was the mission.
There was a chiming noise, and the door moved under his hand, sliding back into the wall. "I guess the sacrifice was accepted." The corridor behind was dark, and Cam moved in, playing his light around the sides and down the hall. He came to a T junction, unsure of which way to go. He tried his radio again, but there was no answer. There had to be a way to choose. He thought back on Jackson's list of common themes in fairy tales. "Follow your heart," he said, turned left. The corridor bent to the right, and Cam could see a red glow ahead, and another turn, this one to the left. "Sheppard!" he yelled. "You down there?"
===-===
John heard noises, faint, and then stopping. There was something like a muted chime, and he got to his feet, stepping toward the force field. A faint sound came through, maybe something like his name. "Over here!" he yelled, thoughtlessly stepping into the danger zone. Instead of forming the white center the force field changed to blue, and John could see through it. The corridor on the other side looked different. He remembered walking here in a straight line, but there was a corner to the right, and the bright circle of a flashlight.
He could feel the rise of anticipation, but he wasn't ready for the wave that hit him when Cam came around the corner.
Too long alone in the dark, thinking, too worried that he'd never be rescued. John struggled to put his walls back into place, and said, as casually as he could, "About time you showed up. I was down to three Power Bars."
"Sheppard, when did you start pulling the damsel in distress bit?" There was something more than Cam's typical twang. "I had to get past a dragon, a giant, and an Ancient machine demanding a sacrifice."
"What?"
"You got yourself stuck in a fairy tale, son, and I'm your knight in shining armor." Cam's grin seemed to have an edge to it, but John couldn't be sure if it wasn't just the distortion of the force field.
"So how do we get me out of here. Before you showed up, this thing turned red and spat fire whenever anyone got near it."
"Guess I've passed the trials," Cam said. "The dragon out front breathed fire, too, 'cept not at me."
"What are you talking about?"
"Typical Ancient stuff," Cam said. "Remember what I told you about having to fight that knight in Avalon?"
"Yeah. There's none of that mythology stuff in Pegasus."
"Well, son, you were imprisoned by a dragon, and legend said that only your true love could get you out."
True love? John wasn't wrong, there was something different in Cam's smile, and it didn't reach his eyes. His eyes looked worried. All John could say was, "Oh."
"Yeah, Oh. If that don't beat all."
John pushed down a tightness in his chest. "But we. I mean. Um." He swallowed. This wasn't how he'd ever want to tell Cam what he felt. Hell, he never wanted to tell him.
"Yeah, I know, but the machines bought it." Cam started looking around the edges of the archway. John watched him, not able to move, replaying Cam's words. The machines bought it. So John was right, and it was one-sided. He took a breath, wanting to say something to reassure Cam that it was all a casual thing, but he didn't get the chance. Cam said, "Now let's get you out of here."
"Any idea how?"
"Nope."
"Let's try something," John said. "Did you touch a force-field earlier?"
"It looked like a mirror at first. And, yeah, it let loose."
"Try that again."
Cam reached out and placed his fingertips gently on the blue glow, jerking back at the initial touch, and then reaching more confidently. Nothing happened, and he pulled his hand back. "Wait," John said, "do that again." Cam re-placed his fingers and John reached up, the way he had before when the force field had shown him Cam in the corridor. He looked at their hands, not at Cam, and the force field changed color around where they touched, going from blue to white to red, and then dissipating between them.
Their fingers met, meshing between each other, until they were holding hands. Cam gave a quick squeeze and let go before John could react.
"Well, that was easy." Cam said, turning away.
"Let's get out of here." They started back down the corridor, but the turn was to the left, not the right. "Wait a minute." John played his flashlight over the new wall. There were slight marks on it, parallel lines that smudged under John's finger. "This was dusty."
"Great," Cam said. "We get a new maze for the way out." They turned and followed the new corridor.
"You have any sense of where we are?" John asked. "It's been long enough since I got down here that I'm not so sure."
"There weren't a lot of turns on my way down here," Cam said, "but if this turns left pretty soon, I think we'll be heading back toward the entrance." They walked in silence, playing their lights over the surfaces of the corridor, until it came to a dead end. "Great," Cam said. "Now what?"
John looked carefully around the walls. There were two indentations, one on each side of a section of paneling, spaced just wide enough apart that he couldn't reach both. He fit his palm into one, and it hummed under his fingers in the way he was used to from Ancient technology, but nothing happened. "Cam, try that one," he said, focusing his light on the matching indentation. Cam placed his palm, but nothing happened. John tucked his flashlight into his belt, then put his left hand on the indentation again, shifted so that he was standing facing the wall section. "Try this," he said, holding up his free hand toward Cam.
He couldn’t read Cam's expression in the low light, but Cam tucked his flashlight in his belt, too, placed his right hand on the indentation on his side, and placed his other palm flat against John's. He wanted to curl their fingers together again, but he barely had time to register the warmth of Cam's touch when he felt a change under his left hand, like Ancient systems coming on line, and the panel in front of them slid up, revealing a dimly lit laboratory.
"Looks like the Goa'uld never found this place," Cam said.
John said. "Careful what you touch. We haven't had the best of luck with secret laboratories."
"Been there. Done that. Wore out the damn T-shirt."
The section of wall slid shut behind them.
Cam and John both walked over to it, but there was no mechanism on the inside, and no other visible exit from the room.
"Great," Cam said. John nodded. "Well, what do we do?"
"Looks like we're going to have to touch things.
"Getting in here required us to do something together," Cam said
"Just like getting me out from behind that force field." John started looking around the lab. There were things that seemed to call out to him, but he resisted the temptation.
"Right, so we look for something that looks like we're supposed to touch it together."
"Yeah," John said, looking at a pair of rounded ovals that stuck out from one of the consoles. "Remember that thing I said about not having the best of luck with secret labs?"
"We'll burn that bridge when we come to it."
"Seriously?"
"What?" Cam said. "It's something my momma used to say."
"Right. Come here."
Cam walked over and turned his light on the ovals. "Think that's it?"
"I'm afraid it is. Remind you of anything?" It was a long shot, but John had to ask.
"Huh," Cam said. "Yeah. Maybe."
"And?"
"Communication Stones."
"I heard about those. People swap bodies, right?" John asked. He didn't like the idea.
"Right, but they both have to be touching them."
"So let's not do that, right?"
"Right."
"Unless there's not any other way out of here."
"And there's no telling whose body we'd end up in. Jackson and Vala got sent across the galaxy," Cam said. "I wish Sam was here."
"I was thinking we could use McKay."
"How do you put up with him?" Cam asked. Sounding genuinely curious.
John looked across the room at where Cam was examining more instrumentation. "He's worth it." he bit out.
Cam shrugged. "If you say so. He actually would be able to get us out of here, wouldn't he?"
"Yep," John said. "So let's look around and try to pretend we're Carter and McKay."
"You might be able to, but I barely got my Master's," Cam said. "I've seen your file, Mr. Genius."
"Hey, that's Col. Genius," John said. "And I'm no McKay."
Cam looked up and grinned. "Sam says it's only because you don't want to be. She liked commanding Atlantis, and she missed you when she left. McKay, not so much, but she thought you were a good influence on him."
John just looked at Cam, wondering about why he'd ever talk about him with Carter, why he'd looked up his file. "She didn't seem like the type to gossip," he said, finally.
"She isn't, but I asked."
"Checking up on me?" John asked, looking at the consoles so he wouldn't think about Cam keeping tabs on him or what that meant. He would never have asked after Cam, never wanted to send any sign that the interest might be too deep. The consoles didn't tell him much of anything. The only real feature was the two upraised ovals.
Cam didn't answer immediately, but eventually said, "You know, just keeping track. I wonder what you're up to sometimes."
John heard something under the surface lightness in Cam's voice, but he wasn't going to ask, and he wasn't going to assume, so he said, "Looks like I'm going to have to touch something."
Cam walked over to the upraised ovals. "These, you think?"
John walked over, stopping a careful foot from Cam. "Yep."
"Count of three?" Cam asked.
"Are we sure there's no other way out of here?"
"I ain't found one, son."
John swallowed. He'd never really been in the field with Cam, and only heard that drawl show up when Cam was drunk or flirting with him, but he pushed aside the distraction. "Let me touch it first." He put his hand on the raised oval and thought, On. Something seemed different, but nothing in the room changed. "Try putting your hand on it." Cam placed his hand, and within a second everything changed.
John could feel an oval under both his left and right hands, and he could feel an empty left hand, and an empty right hand, and two different weights of tac vest on his shoulders. He felt himself pull back his hand, but watched as Cam's hand moved, not his. He felt Cam's, What the fuck? in his own throat even as he heard it.
"Oh, no," John said and heard. They turned to look at each other, and it was like having a mirror tuned wrong. He could see himself and Cam at the same time, only he was Cam looking at himself and at John at the same time. "Oh, no is right," his voice said, but it was Cam's thought.
# communication stones #
^ on steroids ^
# body double instead of body switch #
^ but who's driving the bus? ^
# take turns? #
^ not an octopus ^ can't walk for two ^
# ever tried it? #
^ not exactly an everyday thing ^
"Okay, this is weird," Cam said aloud, and John thought back at him:
^ harder to hear ^ like echo-y phone line ^
# who's thinking what? # can't keep track #
^ let me try something ^
Cam felt his right hand move, and knew he hadn't willed it, saw John's hand also move. John stepped back, willing Cam's body to do the same, and they stepped away from each other.
^ wow ^
# not sure I like not being in control #
^ yeah I got that ^
They both froze, washed over with the memory of John bound and Cam in control, and John caught his breath at the rush of tenderness with the memory—not his own, but Cam's—and sharing Cam's heart-stopping surprise at the strength of John's unnamable feelings. There was no telling who moved first, but the motion was mirrored, Cam's hands on John's face, John holding Cam's head, or maybe it was the other way, but the kiss deepened and lasted and neither of them wanted it to end, desire flowing through and between them and a wordless agreement to do something about it now.
John slid to his knees while Cam's hands undid his gun belt. John's hands took care of the thigh strap at the same time, and Cam's hands lowered the weapon, but John's hands took it and put it on the floor. They both opened Cam's BDUs, and John's head leaned in to take Cam's cock in his mouth, feeling both the weight on his tongue and the heat of his mouth. John's hands swiftly opened his own BDUs, his own cock springing free and he felt Cam felt the touch of his hand, the dry fisting and the wet heat all at once.
# slow down #
^ can't ^ wantwantwant ^
Cam's hands took John's head and pulled him back, and John and Cam both moaned at the loss of sensation and the emptiness in their mouth.
#we have time#
^want ^ joy ^ Cam^
It wasn't words, but feelings, Cam's own face, an impression of touch. John was saying with his body what he wouldn't say aloud, the emotions that threatened to overwhelm him, coming out as action.
"Ah!" Cam's voice said. "Easy."
And Cam meant it more than one way, trying to open himself and accept what John was giving, welcoming, returning, so that they thought their hearts would burst.
^ cliché ^
# truth #
^ want ^
# want #
John slowed and gentled his mouth, but it was as much Cam controlling the motion as John, Cam's hands carding through John's hair, rhythm matching precisely the movements of John's hand on John's cock. John couldn't hold back, pulling Cam with him in twin orgasms that John let Cam shout out, and in the aftermath they shared a momentary flash of vision, of their feelings taking shape and twining around each other like strands of DNA.
It was John that supplied the simile. Cam typically didn't think that way. Yarn, he thought, spun together. John thought that worked, and went through images of braided wire, twisted rope.
It was blindingly fast. Cam could sense John's mind like a complex machine, something that even in this moment of afterglow was analyzing and connecting in ways Cam could barely follow. Through all the visual metaphors, John was already starting to think about what it meant to be twined together.
And then it hit John, what this meant.
^ no no no no no ^
# John ^ John ^ JOHN #
^ no no NO ^
# JOHN # stay with me #
^ OUT ^
# can't #
All Cam can feel from John is a sense of closing off, like the blast doors coming down in Star Wars. He didn't try to get in. Because John was hyperventilating, Cam was too, and one of them has to calm them down enough to get out of here. There were things John never meant him to know. All he could do now was pretend he doesn't know them, and quietly freak out.
===-===
Daniel felt the minute rumble that signaled the opening of the star gate, but it barely intruded on his concentration. SG-4 had brought back images of a new, ancient Goa'uld stronghold, and there were indications that it was the earliest records of the Goa'uld setting themselves up to be gods.
His phone rang, and he ignored it, then it rang again on a different line, the direct one from Jack. He hit the speakerphone. "Yeah?"
"I think you need to meet me in the infirmary," Jack said. "And before you do, take a look again at that thing you translated for Col. Mitchell."
Daniel opened up the picture again and printed it, taking it with him as he made his way to the infirmary, but thinking about the implications of the new Goa'uld site. Jack had arrived before him, and he was looking at Sheppard and Mitchell, sitting side by side on an infirmary bed, about a foot apart, wearing T-shirts and BDUs. Dr. Lam had her eyebrows down. Daniel said, "Col. Sheppard, welcome back."
Sheppard glanced at him and nodded briefly, and Cam's head moved in perfect unison. That was a little weird. "What's going on?"
"It seems that Mitchell and Sheppard are in each others' heads."
"Swapped?"
"No. Sharing. You've had experience with that, I recall," Jack said.
"That was multiple people, but only one body," Daniel said. "And a body switch before that. I'm not sure it's the same. Can you take control over each other? Is there one dominant personality?"
"Only if we want," Mitchell said, and Sheppard tilted his head down. "Mostly it's like experiencing everything in stereo."
"I've been taken over," Sheppard said. "It's different."
Jack said, "So, what exactly did that thing say?"
"Thing?"
"The Ancient writing that Mitchell had you translate."
"Oh. Right." Daniel looked at the printed paper in his hand and read the Ancient. "I offer this my sacrifice," he read. "Did you have to make some kind of sacrifice?"
"Hair," Sheppard answered. "Cam's." Daniel saw his jaw tighten, and a minute shake from Mitchell.
Dr. Lam said, "DNA analysis, perhaps, looking for compatibility? But Col. Mitchell doesn't have the Ancient gene, and gene therapy didn't take with him."
"What about the rest of it?"
Daniel cleared his throat and glanced at Jack. No way was he going to say anything about him most precious in my eyes here in the infirmary. "Something about both may live if one dies."
"Are they cleared to leave the infirmary?" Jack said, in the tone that meant that No was not an acceptable answer.
"Col. Sheppard has been..." Dr. Lam stopped when Jack raised his eyebrows. "He's been without decent food or rest for almost 48 hours, but he'll be fine. I'd like to run some tests on both of them, but I think I can spare them for now."
Jack nodded. "My office in ten, gentlemen."
"Yes, sir." It was two voices in perfect sync and inflection. It was Mitchell's inflection. Daniel didn't know Col. Sheppard very well, but he'd never heard him Yes, sir without some ironic edge to it.
Jack turned on his heel and left the room. Daniel waited and watched while the two men put on their shirts and boots. They didn't move in exact unison, and they didn't look at each other, but Daniel got the feeling he was watching an octopus as they handed over belts or a boot as needed, wordlessly answering requests that weren't asked. They stood, and Mitchell nodded, while Sheppard said, "Ready when you are, Jackson, although I think we both know where we're going."
Daniel couldn't remember Sheppard ever saying that many more words than needed. The cadence was Mitchell, and the voice was Sheppard, and he couldn't stop his eyebrows from going up. "Wow." This had too many implications.
"Sorry," Cam said. "It's just that John was closer to you."
"Are you controlling both bodies?" Daniel asked, looking at Cam.
"No," Sheppard said. "He just talks more."
"This is going to be confusing."
"No kidding." It was Mitchell's voice, but Sheppard's inflections, and it made Daniel's head hurt. Thankfully they didn't speak again until they were in Jack's office.
"Gentlemen," Jack said. "Take a seat. Daniel, you too, since you're the closest thing to an expert. Close the door." Jack didn't sit. He leaned against his desk and took in Mitchell and Sheppard, then reached into a drawer and pulled out a small, pyramid-shaped device. Daniel recognized the bug jammer. This wasn't what he expected for this conversation. "I've had the dubious pleasure of having to share my head, too. Tell us what happened."
There was a pause, and some eye movement, then Sheppard nodded and Mitchell spoke, telling Jack everything that happened from the dragon to the inscription room.
"And the inscription said?" Jack turned to Daniel.
Daniel cleared his throat. He knew what this meant, potentially, for Sheppard and Mitchell. Don't ask, don't tell was stupid, but it was the law they lived under. He hated outing them in front of their commanding officer. His only hope was the bug jammer.
"I offer this my sacrifice
"For him most precious in my eyes;
"Let him always be with me,
"That both may live if one might die."
Sheppard closed his eyes and turned his face toward the wall. He and Mitchell both clasped their hands together, and Mitchell starting talking again, telling the rest of the story, about sacrificing the hair, the hands on the force field to turn it off, both of them needing to touch the sensor pads and each other to open the lab, and then touching what looked like oversized communication stones. Cam's inflections were his own, but he was fairly terse, answering Daniel's interruptions with just enough words to clarify, more like Sheppard would have done. Daniel could tell he was leaving out things, starting from the moment of the sharing of their consciousnesses. Sheppard barely moved, mostly keeping his eyes closed as Mitchell talked, only the occasional half shake or nod Daniel would have expected if it had been Sheppard talking.
"Okay," Jack said. "So, given that Ancient inscription, what do you think happened here?"
Daniel looked at Jack, so he wouldn't have to look at Mitchell and Sheppard. "Without seeing the laboratory, it's hard to tell, but I have an idea. If these are prototypes of the communication stones, or an altered technology, the goal was probably to maintain the memory of someone who was going to die. From SG-17's reports, this lab may have been old enough to be significantly pre-Ascension. The Ancients of the time may have been looking for ways to preserve their best people." Something clicked in Daniel's brain. "The comb. You didn't need it. Do you still have it?"
Mitchell took it out of the pocket of his uniform shirt, and handed it over.
"And you had to sacrifice hair," Daniel mused. "Can I keep this? I've seen artifacts like this in Roman collections, but the decorations are Alteran." He turned it over in his fingers, feeling more excited. "It's also made from Alteran materials. We've never seen anything personal from them, nothing like grooming artifacts."
"Daniel," Jack interrupted. "Do you really think that's just a grooming artifact?" Jack even did the air quotes.
Daniel caught himself. "Given how they found it, probably not. But--" He slowed his thoughts enough to speak. "The gift was a comb, and the sacrifice was hair, and the purpose of a comb is to detangle hair, so it's likely this artifact will be necessary to detangle the colonels here. I'll just photograph and video this, but it should probably stay with them."
"But why would you want to tangle up two people?" Jack asked.
"Maybe it was just an early version of the communication stones. Or maybe it was way to send one person with the capacity of two people," Daniel said. "Could be useful. To have full bi-local awareness."
"Or just a way never to let go," Sheppard said. "Sorry, but the rhyme isn't about tactical capacity."
Jack made a noise. "About that. You probably recognize the device on my desk. We cannot be overheard, and what we say doesn't leave the room. I know you two are sleeping together. Did you have sex the night before the mission?"
Mitchell blushed, but Sheppard went pale. Daniel felt his own face redden. "Why is that relevant?"
"Look, I don't want to get specific about what these boys may or may not do," Jack drawled, "but I learned a thing or two over the years, and my guess is…"
Daniel made the leap. "DNA," he said. He didn't say semen, but he didn't have to.
"Shared, yeah. Guess the safe sex lectures haven't hit home." Jack was looking at Daniel, and neither one of them was looking at Sheppard and Mitchell. Jack snorted and quoted an old movie. "Precious bodily fluids." He snorted. "Kind of has an extra ring with that inscription."
Sheppard snorted, and Daniel looked over to see Mitchell give a half smile, but Sheppard was tense. Mitchell was far more accepting of their situation than Sheppard, and Daniel thought that for all that they said they were sharing consciousness and body awareness, they still were primarily in their own bodies. That was probably good.
Sounding like himself Mitchell said, "Yeah, we figured that out."
"So why would the Ancients restrict this technology to intimate partners?" Daniel asked, and then answered himself. "Compatibility. Not everyone can live inside another's head. That's why the legend couched it as true love."
There was a moment of silence, until Jack said, "Well, I’m real happy for you two, but the fact is that I don’t want to lose two good officers. Any way to reverse this?"
"We tried it in the lab, sir," Mitchell said. "Just touching the stones again and thinking off or reverse didn't do it."
Sheppard said, "So we're thinking maybe we need to go back to Atlantis, because this kind of experiment is totally something Janus would do. The lab reminded me of the one on Atlantis."
Again the cadences were backward, with Sheppard sounding like Cam, but saying things that only Sheppard would think about. Daniel glanced at Jack to see if he noticed, and saw Jack's eyebrows down. He noticed. Daniel looked back to Mitchell and Sheppard. "And Janus came from Pegasus back to Earth."
"And he liked to hide labs," Sheppard said, "but the fairy tale thing seems off. Wouldn't he be Greek gods or something?"
"Roman," Daniel corrected automatically. "But the myths have plenty of the same motifs, and were adopted from the Greeks." The list came easily. "Orpheus and Eurydice had the true love premise, and there was Herakles, or Hercules, and the trials. Oedipus had to answer the riddles of the sphinx. And--"
"We got it, Daniel," Jack interrupted, but Daniel didn't mind. He knew it meant that Jack got the point. Jack turned to Sheppard and Mitchell. "I'm not sure I want to send you two to another galaxy. Lam wants to check you two out, and I'm sure our own brain doctor types are better than what you have on an outpost."
"With respect, sir," Sheppard said, "If we want to reverse this, I think we need to get to the lab Janus left on Atlantis. I think we need McKay."
"And with respect, sir," Mitchell said, and Daniel heard the irony he was used to from Sheppard, and rarely heard from Mitchell, "if we don't do this soon, we won't be able to."
Daniel didn't doubt them. This had to be entirely different from being hijacked. This was more than being married. Jack seemed to agree. "All right. I'll have Lam and the other brain people put together a list of tests they want to run. In the mean time, get back to the infirmary and let Lam finish checking you over, and tell her you have orders to get food first, so swing by the mess hall."
Daniel had watched them dress, and he didn't think it was a good idea for the two of them to be seen acting like they were telepathic. "Jack," he said.
Jack used the too-familiar tone that said he knew he was about to get an argument. "Daniel."
"I think they need to stay out of the public eye. They talk like each other, and they move like one person. Someone's going to notice and ask questions."
Jack looked at him for a moment. "You're right. I'll have an SF bring you something from the mess hall. I think it's lemon chicken tonight. You'll probably want some sleep, so get yourselves back to the infirmary, and then to your quarters. It's not house arrest, but friendly advice." Mitchell and John both held their faces still, probably to keep from rolling their eyes, Daniel thought. Friendly advice from a general was as good as an order, and they knew it. "Dismissed," Jack said.
Daniel watched Mitchell and Sheppard stand and salute, then leave the room with no awkwardness, no hesitating at the door to see who would go first. "Jack," he said, "you might want to get them an SF escort, just to be safe." He glanced over to see Jack gesture with the handset of his desk phone, fingers over the dialing pad.
"Already on it." Jack twisted his mouth in the smile Daniel knew too well. "And would you please go figure out if what they say is happening is really what's happening?
Daniel wanted to wait until the medical exams were over, not wanting to invade their privacy, so he went to his office to finish one more translation from the material SG4 had brought back. It seemed that there was a triggering event, a typical dying and rising god event, probably due to the symbiote healing the host and the response of the humans witnessing the Goa'uld's power. Daniel wondered if there was something left from the Alterans that predisposed the population of that planet to move to worship. This might document the response of that first Goa'uld. Or maybe a skewing of the seasonal death-and-rebirth stories centered around crops or - maybe just seasons.
His phone rang, and he reached for it absently, eyes still on the screen.
"Daniel," Jack said. "Can you please go be my eyes and ears in the infirmary. I need to know if this is any kind of threat, and if those two are going to be okay."
"Just let me--"
"No," Jack said, drawing out the word. "Now. This is important, Daniel. SG-4's discovery can wait."
"How did you--?" How did Jack know what he was working on?
"Please, Daniel."
He closed the windows on his computer, locked his office behind him, and went to the infirmary, where Lam stood looking at Cam on an exam table. He didn't see John. "How's it going?"
"This gives Sheppard a headache," Mitchell said.
Dr. Lam said, "We're trying a physical separation. Col. Sheppard is in my office."
"He's getting the hang of it," Mitchell said, sounding like Mitchell. "It's like when you're flying. Some birds have video input along with instruments to go along with what you can see through the canopy. We should be able to deal with it."
"Is anyone with Col. Sheppard?" Daniel asked.
"No," Dr. Lam said. "He asked to be left alone."
"It's confusing when two people are talking to us. I think we'll get there, but we haven't got the hang of it, yet."
"Maybe I'll go check on him?" Daniel asked.
Mitchell said, "Sure," with an inflection that wasn't Mitchell's, and Daniel looked at him.
"Sorry," Mitchell said. "He... We... Sometimes it kind of goes with who has the stronger feeling." Daniel nodded. There were some parallels to his experiences with multiple consciousnesses in his head. "We're working on it."
Sheppard sat on a chair in Lam's office, looking at Daniel as he walked in. "Okay to talk to you?"
Sheppard hesitated a moment, and then nodded. "Dr. Lam will hold off for a minute."
Daniel wasn't sure if the cadence was Sheppard or Mitchell. "There are a few things we'd like to figure out, like how you determine which one talks."
"And whether we're really sharing consciousness, or if we're an alien something pretending to be us."
"Yeah, that's pretty much it," Daniel said, relieved not to have to beat around the bush. "Who do you think you are?"
"John Sheppard and Cameron Mitchell, sharing two bodies. So far we know which one of us is which, but we're worried it's going to blur."
"So what if I ask you something only Mitchell would know?"
"Wouldn't prove I wasn't an alien something."
Daniel thought for a half second. "True."
"So how do we do this?"
"I'm not sure."
Sheppard paused for a minute. "Sorry. This is like flying on instruments when your visuals aren't in line. Or maybe like a video game with more than one viewpoint on the screen." He shrugged. "We're figuring it out."
"So it feels like two people?" Daniel asked.
Sheppard nodded. "Just aware of everything the other body is aware of. We can talk."
Daniel thought for a minute. "I'm going to ask you to access one of Col. Mitchell's memories. Can you ask him to resist?"
Sheppard's head tilted and he rolled his eyes, saying, "I can hear you just fine, Jackson."
Daniel stood up and stepped around the desk before he knew what he had done. "Okay, that's spooky," he said, but Sheppard had tensed up again. He didn't like it.
"All right. Here's the question. Remember how the Galarans had that memory technology, and you had to supply a true memory?"
Sheppard's face went still. "Yeah."
Daniel saw his jaw jump, but he pressed on. "Can you keep Col. Sheppard from accessing that true memory?" There was a long moment of quiet. Sheppard's head turned to the left, and his hands gripped the edges of the chair. "Can you find it?"
Sheppard looked up. "He's singing La Bamba as loud as possible. I can see something behind it. An explosion from the air. Pain." Sheppard drew a breath. "I'm stopping."
"Okay." Daniel nodded. "You're still separate enough to be able to guard your thoughts. That's good." Daniel steeled himself to deal with the weirdness and said, "Col. Mitchell?"
Mitchell's "Yes," came drawling in Sheppard's tense voice.
"Are you okay?" Daniel asked. "I'm sorry if that was too intrusive."
Sheppard's eyes narrowed, but it was clearly Mitchell answering. "I didn't tell you then, and I'm not planning to tell you now."
The door opened, and Dr. Lam stuck her head in. "What are you doing?
"I'm trying to figure out what the parameters are."
"And you're not letting the shrinks and neuro people do that, why?" Sarcasm and anger edged through her voice.
Daniel blinked at her. "Because they've probably never experienced anything like what these two are going through, and because I was tasked by Gen. O'Neill to determine if what they say about their link is true, and if it's a security risk."
"I have a patient out there who is no longer responding to me, and is clearly in distress, but I can't find out why because he's not responding. What is going on in here?"
"I'm sorry, Carolyn," Mitchell said, walking up behind Dr. Lam. Daniel glanced at Sheppard, and saw that he had closed his eyes. Looking back at Mitchell, Daniel could see that his eyes were slightly red. "Jackson, don't make us do this."
"We need to know--"
"I heard you. You get that, right? I was not in the room, and I heard you, and I can feel my ass on that chair," Mitchell said, pointing toward Sheppard, "and one of us has been stuck in a rock cave for two days, making both of us dog tired. Carolyn, are we medically cleared?"
"Yes, if you tell me what just happened a minute ago."
"I had to tune you out. Jackson was trying to get Sheppard here to dig into my memories, and asking me to block it. Took some effort."
"La Bamba," Sheppard said. And then his head snapped up, and he turned to look at Mitchell. Daniel realized they had carefully not been looking at each other. Expressions too fast for Daniel to track crossed their faces, and he realized they were talking, and it was more than telepathy. In an instant they both went tense, Sheppard more than he already had been, almost vibrating.
Dr. Lam said, "Are you okay?"
"No," Cam said, while Sheppard said, "Yeah."
"Which is it?"
"Both," Sheppard said. "We need to eat, and we need to sleep, and we need you to stop poking at us until tomorrow. Put your guards on us, and let us go."
Mitchell added, "Please."
===-===
John lay on the bed in the guest quarters, too exhausted to sleep, too distracted by Cam moving and looking around in another room. He knew that Cam believed they were in this together, but John wondered how Cam could tell if the feelings were really his own, or if they came from John and he couldn't tell the difference? The walls around things he would never have said now had to hide things he shouldn't think. Before their minds linked, Cam had never given John anything to let him think they would ever be more than "friends with benefits". He had to protect Cam from feeling things that came only from John.
Cam said that they were in this together, but John didn't believe him. When he had seen Cam's memory of a bomb exploding on a civilian convoy, a bomb Cam had dropped from his plane, Cam had shoved John back from the thoughts, but not before John felt the wave of regret that Cam lived with that always, and he didn't want John to know. John could grant him that privacy, walling himself in and walling Cam out. He had let his own guard down completely in that Ancient laboratory, let Cam in. Cam had seen what he was never supposed to know.
John Sheppard, who’d successfully resisted an Asuran mind probe, could shut Cam Mitchell out of his thoughts. And if he really worked at it, he could shut himself out, too, ruthlessly quashing the niggling voice that told him he didn’t really want to keep Cam out. But it was for the best.
It was.
John was jerked back into double awareness when Cam heard a knock at his door. John tried to ignore it, but he could hear Jackson's voice. "Hi. Sorry. Just one thing I was wondering."
John took hold of the vocal chords. "Go away."
# stop it #
^ I was almost asleep ^
# liar #
John chewed on that word, hearing Cam say, "Seriously," feeling him stand so that Jackson couldn't enter the room. "Write it on a Post-It and talk to me about it tomorrow."
Jackson's eyebrows went down, and Cam thought it hadn't occurred to him that whatever he was curious about wouldn't be welcome. "Right. Tomorrow. Sorry."
Cam nodded and closed the door, stripped to his shorts and got in the bed.
# sleep #
^ can't ^ saw what you remembered ^ bomb ^ civilians ^
John felt like a coward, using Cam's memory of setting loose a bomb seconds before the intel that these were civilians and a countermanding order came through. He wasn't sure if it was just a tactic to distract Cam, or if he genuinely wanted to let Cam talk about it. John felt nothing from Cam for a long moment.
# and? #
^ not your fault ^
# so they tell me #
^ Jackson's an asshole for going there ^
# sometimes # not sure he's human anymore #
John agreed. Jackson's dispassion was of a different degree than the observer mindset he was used to from the scientists on Atlantis. He wondered what Jackson had seen that made O'Neill suggest the separation.
^ hey^
# what #
^ listen ^
John played through his own worst memory of Afghanistan, of the failed rescue, of the dead. There were the bodies of his friends and comrades, and the bodies of the insurgents John had killed trying to rescue them.
There was a long pause.
# goodnight #
Cam's thought sounded final, and John felt him get into the bed and turn on his side. The different sensations of pressure on his back where he lay, and on his side where Cam lay, was distracting, so John rolled over, too. He couldn't sleep, as tired as he was, because Cam's brain was running through the day, thinking about John, and loudly trying not to. The noises Cam heard, the feel of movement when John hadn't moved, flashes of the bomb hitting a convoy of civilian Afghanis... John couldn't shut down both his brain and Cam's.
^ not working ^
# no #
^ idea ^
# go #
^ Beretta ^
# WHAT # NO #
^ not that ^ no no no ^ don’t believe in 45-caliber pain relief ^
There was a moment of mental silence.
# don’t scare me like that #
John thought about cleaning a Beretta M9, starting with ejecting the magazine.
^ just walk through it with me ^
They went through the steps together, mentally reassembling the weapon after a thorough cleaning, and then John started them on the P90. They rehearsed pulling the magazine from the top, clearing the chamber, and taking it apart to clean. John made them imagine every swipe of the cleaning cloth, in the same amount of time it would take to do the work for real. They were asleep before they got to re-assembling the weapon.
===-===
Daniel watched them walk up the ramp to the open gate and fell in behind them. Restoration of the gate bridge had made the transit simple again, if energy-intensive, but Sheppard had already been scheduled to return. Sheppard and Mitchell walked up the ramp in step, a careful foot between them. They stepped into the Atlantis operations center, greeted by a team of Marines with their weapons not quite at the ready. McKay and Woolsey were on the balcony above.
"Welcome back, Col. Sheppard. Welcome to Atlantis, Dr. Jackson and Col. Mitchell." Daniel noted how Woolsey ordered the names. "Shall we quickly meet to, uh, bring us all up to speed?"
Maj. Lorne was already in the conference room, and Daniel gave him a nod, which he returned. Lorne was steady, and had seen a lot. This wouldn't bother him too much.
McKay took a seat next to Woolsey, Lorne and Jackson, barely containing himself until the door closed. "Is there a reason why Teyla and Ronon weren't invited to this little meeting?"
"We're trying to keep the situation as contained as possible," Daniel said, taking the seat opposite Woolsey.
"Contained why? How many of us around the table have had experience with someone else's consciousness in their head?" McKay said, raising his hand, and looking pointedly at Daniel.
"Not me," Maj. Lorne said. Daniel looked at him, and he shrugged. "At least not yet."
Sheppard's hand went up, and he said to Mitchell, "Before you."
Daniel took a breath. "Gen. O'Neill's orders are that Sheppard and Mitchell be kept separate from everyone else, and from each other."
"So their consciousnesses were fused," McKay said. "Big deal. At least they have two bodies. Having Cadman in my head and taking my body out for a run, kissing Carson--well, that seems worse. And no one made me sit in a room by myself."
"We'd rather not have this be public knowledge."
"Look," McKay said, "I could gladly not see Col. Mitchell and his lemon again, but I don't see the problem here. If the two of them can figure out how to move around without tripping over things, what's the problem?"
"They have equivalent security clearances," Woolsey put in. "There's no issue with them overhearing sensitive information."
"These are his orders."
"But this is a civilian operation," Woolsey said.
Daniel glanced at Lorne. His face was carefully blank.
Daniel sighed and rubbed his nose under his glasses. "Look, it's spooky being around them, and the SGC doesn't want their situation widely known.”
"Spooky how?" McKay asked.
"Sometimes you know that one of them is talking out of the other's mouth. Sometimes they move in lockstep."
"Well that makes a certain amount of sense," Rodney said. "If they have equal potential attention to each of the bodies' movements, working out, even walking, could be problematic." He stopped. "Huh. I wonder how cool it would be to be able to be in two places at once. Think of the work I could get done."
"Rodney," Sheppard said.
Daniel looked at Sheppard and Mitchell. Mitchell had his eyes on the table, looking at a space between where his hands lay flat.
"They have to stay separate because it spooks Gen. O'Neill." McKay used the air quotes, reminding Daniel of Jack, but unlike Jack he did not wait for a response. "Look, if we're going to solve this, we're going to need them. Ancient technology works for Col. Sheppard better than for just about anybody besides Gen. O'Neill. If this is something Janus did after he returned to the Milky Way galaxy, I'm not sure what we'll find here that would be helpful, anyway, but we're not going to fix it without his help." Rodney considered for a moment. "He'll have to keep his Mitchell half out of the way."
Daniel looked over and saw an identical smirk of amusement on Sheppard and Mitchell's faces and glanced at McKay, who had frozen at the sight.
"Spooky. Okay, I'll grant you that."
Daniel said, "Maj. Lorne has General O'Neill's orders, and Mr. Woolsey has my recommendations. The problem is yours, gentlemen."
Woolsey said, "We will certainly take your recommendations and Maj. Lorne's orders as a starting place." Daniel knew exactly what that meant. Woolsey was going to make up his own mind. Interesting to think he'd ever underestimated the man. Woolsey rose, ending the meeting, adding, "We have accommodations for both of you gentlemen. There's someone waiting to show you to your quarters. Dr. Jackson, and Dr. Corrigan has made space for you in the Anthropology labs with an Ancient computer console."
===-===
John sat in his quarters, facing his Johnny Cash poster. They'd walked directly to their quarters after the meeting, Lorne escorting Cam.
# we did good not talking out of each others' mouths that time #
^ yeah ^
John kept his mind blank, looking at the poster.
# least you got something to look at #
John ignored Cam's thought. He was almost relieved that they had been confined to quarters, because when they were stuck in guest rooms under the mountain, it had been easier to deal with two sets of sensations that were from very similar environments.
# John #
^ what ^
# aren't you going to show me around #
^ you've been here before ^
# c'mon # you want out as much as I do #
^ can we at least wait to talk with Woolsey ^
John felt the breeze on Cam's skin as he walked out on to the balcony connected to the VIP quarters.
# it really is beautiful here #
John's room didn't even have a window. He retaliated to Cam's image of the open sea, the farther towers of the city, by opening his duffel and putting away his things, focusing his eyes on the most mundane of tasks.
# John #
John ignored him.
# Sheppard # damn it #
John paused, let himself into Cam's senses, feeling the railing under their hands, and squinting against the glare of the sun. It seemed brighter, and John wondered if that was because Cam's eyes were blue. That brought up a memory of Cam looking at him, hand on John's face, trying to calm him down in the Ancient lab, seeing his own eyes through Cam's at the same time, and trying so hard not to let Cam's gaze see more than the surface.
# Sheppard # John # I want to see you #
Cam's thought was softer, catching John's memory of that moment in the laboratory and together they felt the catch in the chest, Cam taking the memory to the moment before John started freaking out. John pulled up the wall, locking Cam out.
^ I'll go look in a mirror for you ^
# cute #
^ if you think we had to be careful on Earth it’s a goldfish bowl here ^
Cam didn't say anything.
^ okay to get a shower ^
# yeah # be right there #
Cam didn't mean there as in John's room, but in the shower as well. Those kinds of sensations were easier when they did them together. They undressed in tandem and walked into their bathrooms.
# I intend to take a long shower #
John snorted.
^ what if I don't want to ^
# like you can hide that from me #
Cam felt John snort again, amusement and annoyance both, but the arousal was shared.
# it'll feel good #
They turned on the water in their showers and brought it to the temperature they each liked, Cam using the controls, feeling John turn it on with a thought. Cam had heard about how the ATA positives could just do things with Ancient technology, but he wasn't ready for how it felt--natural to John, but strange to Cam, like the memory of a static charge.
They stepped under the water. John preferred it to be almost too hot to take, and Cam liked his warm, but not too hot. When they stepped under the water, the dual sensations were distracting, pleasant, and exciting. They washed their hair, left arm, right arm, neck in stereotyped behavior, almost perfectly in concert. John's feet were more sensitive, which Cam thought was hilarious.
^ stop that ^
In answer Cam ran his hand across his chest, and rolled one of his nipples between his fingers. John caught his breath and froze. Cam moved John's hand up to the opposite side of John's chest, stopping short of using John's fingers, leaving his hand where he could mirror Cam's movements on his own body.
Cam could feel John's hesitance, the embarrassment. Without John thinking the words, Cam could tell he'd never done anything like this--he didn't mean taking a long shower and getting himself off, because John had done that plenty of times, but feeling like he was doing it in front of someone else? Cam felt John's arousal fading, and with it, his own.
# you're with me # you could let me drive and I could just do it for you # or the other way around #
^ ??? ^
# make my hands do what your hands do # show me what you like # do to me what I did to you #
Cam pulled up the memory of what it had been like to have John splayed out, to touch him wherever and however he wanted, to bring those reactions, to give that pleasure to John. He tried hard not to send the emotions he felt, because those caused John to close himself off in his brain. Cam rolled his own nipple between his fingers, trailing his other hand across his belly, focusing only on the sensation.
# c'mon, buddy # this is gonna be fun #
John swallowed. Cam felt it, felt the strange rush of stress that wasn't his own, and he worried that he was pushing too hard.
# sorry #
In answer, John made Cam's hand circle his cock, and then, using only his fingertips, slowly stroke up from the root to the head. They rode sensation into a place where there was no thinking at all.
===-===
"Colonel!" Rodney's voice was slightly muffled through John's door. Cam felt the wash of affection through John, the clear Rodney, and not McKay. He closed his eyes so he wouldn't distract John, and tried not to interfere.
John opened the door, and without waiting for an invitation, Rodney swept into the room. "So you've got Col. Mitchell in your head?"
"Nice to see you, too Rodney. Long time and all that."
"Yes, well, more important things to deal with than social niceties at the moment." Rodney turned. "We've already started looking through Janus's hidden lab and computer records. I understand Col. Mitchell has a comb that's supposedly important?"
John had forgotten about the comb Cayer Sinzi had given Cam. Cam reached to his front pocket where he kept it safe and felt the outlines through the pocket. "Yeah," John said.
"We need to analyze it. There may be something about the material that will tell us something important."
"Cam has it," John said, then corrected himself. "Col. Mitchell."
"If he's in your head, I can't imagine you're not on a first-name basis. Can you, I don't know, think at him to come here?"
"We're supposed to stay out of sight," John said.
"Fine, fine. I'll go to the VIP quarters. Can you let him know I'm coming?" Rodney paused on his walk to the door and turned part way to look at John. "He, um, doesn't have a lemon this time, does he?"
"No, Rodney."
# more's the pity #
^ behave ^
# you actually like him #
^ yeah ^ yeah I do ^
# oh #
^ not ^ not that way ^ ! ^
"Colonel, were you talking with him just now?" Rodney's expression was part curiosity and part fear.
"Yeah," John said. "He knows you're coming to get the comb."
"Could you, maybe, I don't know, control Col. Mitchell's body so he doesn't threaten me?"
# what the hell #
^ he's kidding ^ sort of ^
"You'll be fine, Rodney."
# don't know what you see in him #
^ haven't you read our AARs? #
# he's # I don't know # obnoxious #
^ not always ^ or not always in ways I mind ^
# you're not blonde and female # you should see how he talks to Carter #
^ didn't do it when she was commander ^ he's changed ^ Siberia and then Pegasus ^ O'Neill and Jackson bring out the worst in him ^
# if you say so #
John was irritated, and he let himself remember Rodney's best moments--the flashes of brilliance and bravery, and easy banter of movie nights.
# okay okay # fine # I get it # there's more to him and all that #
John smiled at Cam's irritation. Rodney was an acquired taste, but he was probably the best friend John had ever had.
# your other friends must have sucked #
John knew Cam was joking, but he wouldn't let Holland or anyone else be tossed off in that way. He pulled himself back from Cam.
Cam barely saw the flash of a face and name, Lyle Holland, and a rapid fire of images of John going after him, but after that, the wall came up.
Cam heard the knock.
^ McKay's there ^ be nice ^ he can fix this ^
===-===
# how come I don't get any visitors #
^ close your eyes and watch the movie with us ^
===-===
John and Cam walked together through the corridors, side by side so that they couldn't see each other. At least Lorne hadn’t posted guards on them, so the only attention they drew was welcoming, with some curiosity about Cam's presence. Cam sensed the tension thrumming through John. He tried to lighten the mood.
# wish we had transporters in the mountain #
^ every time I'm back on Earth I keep thinking the elevators aren't working right ^ not used to the motion ^
# can't believe they let us out of our rooms #
^ stir crazy ^ I hate the way you do squats ^
# how is there a wrong way to do squats # let's go running tomorrow #
^ don't know if I can keep up with Ronon any more ^
# all the more reason to go with me #
Cam didn't push farther. John was still tense, though, and he wasn't quite sure why. After more than a week of living in each other's heads, they'd reached some equilibrium, mostly consisting of John behind his walls, and Cam not pushing it, getting only occasional glimpses of the sheer speed of John's thoughts.
The strangest thing was how much Cam missed John. Being this close and knowing he was closed off was worse than being in separate galaxies. He knew what John felt for him. He'd felt love so clearly in the Ancient laboratory that he couldn't understand why it was so important to John to hide it now. When they got themselves off together now, that was all it was--sensation and not emotion. Maybe that was all it really was for John, because Cam couldn't imagine that John liked him for his mind. Compared to McKay, Cam was an idiot. Not that he'd ever admit it to McKay.
In the transporter Cam was close enough to smell him, and it brought up sense memories of touching John, of tasting himself in John's mouth, hearing the noises he finally got John to make, of making the noise for both of them. Being with him.
^ you're kidding ^ now? ^ really? ^
# want #
Desire, something far bigger than lust, slipped out of Cam's thoughts in a wordless rush before he could clamp down on it. His mouth watered and felt empty, the tightness beginning in his groin. He took a deep breath, quickly, and felt John doing the same, calming himself, themselves, down. John's mental doors slammed shut again, and when the transporter opened, John stepped out first. Cam concentrated his gaze between John's shoulders so that John had one relevant sight line, and he ignored the weight of rejection in his chest so John had no distractions as they walked toward Janus's lab. They walked in step, and Cam used the memory of marching in basic training to calm himself.
There were guards outside the hidden lab, but that was always true. It wasn't quite a punishment detail, but if they had two guards 24/7 on the most boring job in the city, the lab must be very dangerous.
^ yep ^
The Marines on guard drew up and saluted them. John simply nodded, but Cam saluted back, not looking directly at them so as not to confuse John. Then John disappeared, walking right through the wall. Cam stopped.
^ come on ^
Through John's eyes he could see the laboratory, and through John's ears he could hear McKay saying, "There you are, Colonel." Cam stepped forward, expecting to bump his nose on the wall he could see, but it was easier than going through the star gate. Now he could see what John saw. They were looking at different parts of the room, but it felt to Cam like he suddenly had panoramic vision. It melded together into a single picture, which was cool. Maybe staying separated hadn't the best way to deal with this.
"McKay," Cam said, "got any ideas how to untangle us?"
"I called you down because I need to see if you both are needed. I was able to find something in the computer records that matched up with the," and here Rodney paused to use air quotes, "fairy tales that Dr. Jackson sent. He was sure the comb thing hadn't come from the Milky Way galaxy, and he was right. It's from Pegasus, given some of the signatures in the materials. We've even figured out where it's most likely from."
"That's good news," John said.
"Yes, that's the good news, but given that this is the Pegasus galaxy, there's always going to be bad news to go with it."
"So what's the bad news?"
Cam wasn't sure which one of them had spoken, but McKay looked at him, and then back to John.
"Rodney?" John said, prompting and dreading the answer.
"It's on a planet we know that the Wraith visit regularly. PX5-389."
Cam felt John's flush of anger, and apprehension, which had to be big to get over the wall, but all John said was, "Oh."
"Huh?" Cam looked for why this planet made John angry, but Rodney was talking to him.
"There's an Ancient facility we haven't been able to fully explore because whenever we've tried, the Wraith show up. We can't find any sort of beacon in the facility, but we've come in cloaked in the jumper, and that only bought us an extra hour. There's no ZPM there--it runs on geothermal--but we know there were laboratories there. It's partly hidden, and we can't even get in without someone with the Ancient gene." Rodney turned away, walking toward one of the consoles. Cam and John both followed, because Rodney, McKay, hadn't stopped talking.
"We need to go there. I hadn't had reason to look into whether Janus had records of the place, because there wasn't any indication that the laboratories were connected, and frankly I don't know who invented the Ancient's file system, because finding things has always been a problem. But I was able to find something on it by connecting both the laboratory on PX5-389, Janus, the comb, and uh, your predicament."
Cam wished the man would get to the point, but John smiled, and Cam could feel that it was a fond smile. He mentally rolled his eyes at John, but John just smiled more.
# seriously he's a pain #
^ you know anybody smarter? ^
# Carter #
^ nope ^ close though ^
# you #
John didn't answer the thought. His mind was carefully blank.
# John #
^ I'm not in their league ^
# yeah # you are # I'm not in your league #
John was silent again. Cam had pushed somewhere else he didn't belong.
"Would you two stop doing that?" Rodney said.
"Doing what?" John said.
"Talking amongst yourselves. It shows."
"Can you get to the point, McKay?" Cam asked.
"Fine, I'll use small words. Go to PX5-389. Take the comb. Find the machine with a comb-shaped thing. Stick the comb in it. Activate it. Should work."
"What does does this machine look like?"
"No idea. I just know from the records that it should exist. You're the ones that should be able to ID it."
"Let's gear up," John said, looking at McKay.
"Don't we need to clear the mission?" Cam asked.
"I'll do that while we're gearing up."
===-===
Cam kept himself back and continued to follow John's lead. John's mind wasn't open to him, the laser focus impenetrable even without the wall that John was able to maintain. He could feel and see everything John did, but he couldn't follow his thoughts.
It wasn't Cam's place to speak up here, anyway. It wasn't his team or even his galaxy. John gave him a headset first, and Cam simply listened as Woolsey approved the mission, as Maj. Lorne agreed to put together a team of Marines to go with them. John handed him a tac vest in the right size. Nothing would go this fast under the mountain at Stargate Command. Landry would have to have a discussion of the pros and cons. Woolsey just wished them Godspeed.
John was grateful that Cam seemed to want to come along for the ride, that he wasn't interfering or offering his own opinion on the planning. John had been to PX5-389 twice, and this time he was going to do everything he could to slow down the Wraith. He still didn't know how they found them every time. He planned their mission in his head as they went through the motions of gearing up and walking to the jumper bay. Six Marines were waiting for them, and John opened the back ramp with a wave and a thought, then turned to face the Marines as Teyla and Ronon walked up to see them off. John was glad to see them, and so was Cam.
Ronon slapped Cam on the back. "Hear you have Sheppard in your head."
"Yep."
Ronon snorted. "Better you than me." Cam shook his head, but kept his eyes down, not looking at John and putting his gaze on something John could ignore.
"Alright," John said, and Cam felt all of that laser focus, the planning in John's head, come to a halt. It was execution time. When John spoke, still in a conversational tone, all the side chatter stopped. Cam felt, shared, John's poise and confidence. He knew his people and trusted them. "Some of you may have heard the rumor that I'm sharing headspace with Col. Mitchell there. If you think that's weird, you haven't been in the SGC long enough." That got the expected chuckle. "Dr. McKay thinks a lab on PX5-389 will have what we need to get us back into our own heads." There were some groans at that.
"All of you have been to PX5-389. You know what happens. We're going in cloaked, but I'm going to leave a team to watch the gate. Your job is to stay hidden and watch what happens. DelCalstillo and Haight, you're with Teyla and Ronon. If anything comes or goes through the gate, use radio click signals. The rest of us will fly straight to the outpost. Two guards on the jumper. Sherman and Rodrigues, that's you. The rest of us will recon as fast as we can, find the machine, and get this little problem taken care of. If Col. Mitchell gives you an order, follow it as if it was from me. It might actually be."
Cam felt the muscles of John's face move deliberately into the half-smile Cam knew so well from the other side. How much of what John showed was ever genuine? John nodded at him, not saying or thinking anything, but Cam's mind flashed to John tied down, John to the point of begging, John's mouth on him in the Ancient lab and two groans together from Cam's throat, John's fingers reaching back in the shower, soap slick and sliding in, and Cam hadn't even known John wanted that...
John turned into the jumper, and Cam felt his jaw tighten.
^ stop it ^
# sorry #
Teyla and Ronon took the seats behind the pilot and co-pilot, leaving Cam to sit in the back with the Marines. He made eye contact and nodded at them, and then said, "I'm going to shut down here so I don't distract Sheppard."
He leaned back and closed his eyes, and watched/felt/was John piloting the jumper.
The first step was a short one, through the gate, which was in a forest clearing. They landed about a quarter of a mile away, and John opened the back of the jumper.
"Don't like guard duty," Ronon said.
John rose from the pilot seat and walked back. "If anything comes through the gate, you can handle it. DelCastillo and Haight will stay with you. Look, if it's the locals, Teyla can talk to them, and if it's Wraith the four of you can more than hold your own. We’d like to know how they're finding out we're here, but we need to get this mission done.”
Teyla nodded, pulling Ronon by the arm, and they went down the ramp with the two Marines.
John moved back to the pilot seat, and the jumper took off.
John let him feel this, the physical sensations of the controls, even when John was just using gestures on the heads-up display. Cam shared the sensations of how John felt the jumper, knew without looking exactly how the drives were operating. It wasn't like flying conventional aircraft, where the pilot could feel the force of movement, the vibration of the engines going down to his bones. Instead it was entirely mental, almost disconcerting that his body couldn't feel what his mind knew was happening, or felt it in a different way. John was aware of the jumper in a way that went beyond sensation, the movements of his hands necessary, but almost secondary. For the first time, Cam was jealous of the ATA for more than practical reasons. This would be an amazing thing to fly on a regular basis.
# wow #
^ yeah ^
It was too short. In fifteen minutes they landed, and filed out of the jumper. Cam looked back and it wasn't there, except that he could see inside from where the ramp was open.
# that's cool #
^ never gets old ^
# I want one #
^ get in line ^
Cam looked at the entrance to the facility.
# seen this before #
^ Bendrinzi site ^
"Care to share with the class?" Rodney said.
"I thought the Bendrinzi site looked familiar, but their archeologist said it was probably a factor of all the Ancient sites being similar," Sheppard answered. "It looks almost exactly like this."
Rodney snorted and said, "Clock is ticking on Wraith coming, so let's see what we can find. Can you two, uh, separate? It would go faster since you're more likely to recognize what we're looking for."
They nodded, and Cam kept silent as John gave the final orders. That was his place with SG-1, although they really didn't need orders, or even listen to him half the time. Everyone here was paying close attention to John, even McKay, Cam never would have guessed at this part of him--efficient calm over the adrenaline of a mission--given the laid-back veneer he let Cam, let most people, see. He was a hell of a commander, if this was any indication. "Jefferson, Rodney, you're with Col. Mitchell. I'll take Sloane," John said, nodding toward the Marines. Cam mentally groaned at being stuck with McKay, but he didn't argue, and John shot him a quelling thought. "Rodrigues and Sherman, you're on guard. If you see Wraith, use the click codes, and we'll get out of here as fast as we can."
John walked over and stood shoulder to shoulder with Cam, actually touching for the first time since they had come back from the Bendrinzi's planet. Cam wanted to lean into the double sensation, but he held himself straight.
^ we don't have a lot of practice operating separately ^
# we can do it #
^ let me know if you need me to shut my eyes ^
# same here #
^ don't give Rodney a hard time ^ he and Jefferson know how to deal with Wraith ^
# shoot at the head right? #
John sent a mental image of a video-game style exploding head and blue-green blood, and Cam smiled.
"Gentleman?" Rodney said, full McKay sarcasm dripping through the word.
"Let's move," John said. As he stepped in, the lights came up. Cam could feel the sensation he slotted as Ancient tech, but it was John's.
The facility was alarmingly like the Bendrinzi one, down to the first rooms having been stripped, but this one looked dismantled rather than scavenged. The corridor ended in a T junction. Cam went left, and John took the right, and as they moved, Cam could feel his brain almost straining. He closed his eyes, and that helped only a little. John seemed to be moving with no problem.
"Colonel?" McKay said.
"It's weird. We shouldn't be on a mission like this without having practiced." Cam could feel John listening, which was new.
Jefferson said, "Can't imagine their corridors look much different."
"No, but they took a left back there, and ours is going straight."
"It's a mapping problem," Jefferson said.
McKay looked at the Marine, his eyebrows down, and Cam waited for some sarcastic remark, but McKay said, "What do you mean?"
"Our brains are constantly making maps of where we are and where we've been. It's a combination of what we see and like a memory of our own movements, you know? Where we've been and how long it took to get from point A to point B?"
McKay nodded. "And Col. Mitchell has two maps going on at the same time, and he's only physically in one of the places."
"Right," Jefferson said. "If you can change what you expect, you might be able to do it. You know, be conscious of making a bigger map with two parts."
# that what you're doing? #
^ I guess ^
# should have told me #
^ didn't think you I needed to ^
# we're not all geniuses #
^ never said I was ^ Rodney's a genius ^
Cam snorted aloud.
# Marine made the call #
^ Jefferson's pretty smart ^ too smart ^ he gets bored and the next thing he knows he's a private again ^
Cam snorted again.
# you keep yourself walled off so I won't slow you down #
^ no ^
Something slipped out with that no, and emotion that pulled at Cam, answered his own, and disappeared again as fast as John could shut Cam out. Cam bit back a sigh, wondering when he’d turned into a teenager.
^ big map ^ you'll be fine ^
John shared an image with Cam of a grid with corridors laid out, starting with the entrance, the T, the turn John had made, and the corridor Cam, McKay and Jackson were in.
Cam opened his eyes, looked ahead, and built both maps--one big map--in his head as they moved through the facility. The longer he did it, the easier it got.
---=---
John kept track of where Cam, Rodney, and Jackson were, relative to where he was, building a model of the corridors in his head.
John's thoughts wandered a bit behind the wall between him and Cam. If they were successful here, they'd be back to being single people, and Cam would stop feeling what John felt. John hated the L word, but that moment in the original facility had felt pure and like nothing else. Since then Cam had thought about not much more than sex. John knew men were supposedly thinking about sex all the time, but that had never been him, and he assumed it was an exaggeration. From his glimpses into Cam's head, it might actually not be. John snorted.
"Sir?" Sloane said.
"Nothing." They came to a T. "Twenty paces. See what you see. I'll go this way."
"Mine turns right."
John glanced ahead. "Mine turns left. Parallel corridors. Hang on."
^ how are you doing? ^
John paid attention to Cam's senses. He could see corridor, and hear Rodney muttering.
# nice of you to join us # you find anything? #
^ it all looks disassembled ^
# here too #
^ okay ^ just checking in ^
John's radio headset clicked three times with the sound of someone opening the mic, but not speaking. It was followed by 14 single clicks, six doubles, and two triples.
^ sorry ^
His thought to Cam was fast before he used Cam's voice to whisper, "You hear that, Rodney?"
"Yes," Rodney hissed, "and since when do you…"
"This is Sheppard."
"Okay. That is weird."
"Click code says we've got company," John whispered through his own mouth and Cam's. As much for Cam's benefit he added, "Three clicks means it came from Rodrigues at the jumper, so the team at the gate are either down, or the Wraith came from somewhere else."
John didn't let himself feel anything about Ronon and Teyla. If they were down or captured, he'd deal with it later.
"How did they know we were here?" Rodney whispered. "We can't find any Wraith tech here at all."
"That code didn't make sense," Sloane said.
"I've got a hunch," Jefferson said. "Bugheads. Wraith worshippers," he added, seeing Cam's confusion. If they're keeping an eye on this place, they might be the ones alerting the Wraith. They also might be with them."
John groaned mentally. It made sense.
# people worship these things? #
^ yeah ^ sorry for highjacking your mouth ^
# I can think of better things to do with it than talk to McKay #
^ is this really the time? ^
He got fury from John, and Cam realized what he'd done. Ronon and Teyla were at the gate, and they had no idea if they were okay. This time it was Cam who put up the wall, thin as it was by comparison. It was how he dealt. Wise cracks and momentary thoughts of sex, and with John in his head it felt easy to do both at once, but he'd crossed a line.
# sorry #
John spoke through both his mouth and Cam's. "We're sitting ducks in these corridors. We need to get to a defensible room. That one you passed about fifty steps back. We'll meet you there." John motioned to Sloane and they reversed course, but it wasn't fast enough. Coming down the corridor they heard footsteps. They ducked back.
John heard footsteps on Cam's end, too, but they had made it to the room. He looked quickly and counted one Wraith the size of Todd, three drones, and six or seven humans. Cam and Jackson were taking position, and firing already, and John was suddenly disoriented, unable to keep track of both Cam's body and his own, feeling the kick of a P90 in his hands while he crouched behind the corner, holding his still.
"Sir?" Sloane whispered.
"Get me moving," John managed through the echo of bullets and stunners. His fingers twitched. "They're fighting." He was trying hard not to distract Cam. The walls worked to keep out the thoughts, but Cam would feel everything John felt. "I can…"
Sloane got it, and he put John's hand on his broad shoulder to lead him down the hall at a trot. John kept his mind blank, feeling Cam's revulsion at the blue-green spatter of Wraith blood, his fear of hitting the humans, and the sound of Rodney yelling, "Now! Now!"
Cam and Jefferson pulled back and the door closed. McKay slumped against an open section of wall where he had been working. The room was seemingly bare, but the wall panels looked familiar. Cam walked the perimeter, sliding his hand over them, looking to see if one would open up or light up, like the one on the Bendrinzi world, saying, "Now what?" He's asking John as much as Jefferson and McKay.
^ you're safe? ^
# for the moment #
John took a breath and let go of Sloane, tapping him once and saying, "I'm back. They're holed up in a room. We need cover."
John doesn't know where they are. When the fighting broke out on Cam's side, he lost track of the map he'd been making. "You're going to have to lead."
They took a right at a T junction, and Sloane said, "Here, sir." Sloane cornered the doorway to a room, weapon up, clearing it. John followed and looked at the walls. They were bare.
"Rodney," John said through Cam's mouth. "It's Sheppard. How did you closed the door?"
"Panel to the left, standard control circuits, but missing a key crystal. I hotwired over it."
John felt the wall, felt the stuttering hum of technology not quite answering, and pulled out his knife to pry up the panel. He could see what Rodney meant, and at the same time he heard footsteps. He worked as fast as he could, but Sloane said, "They're here!" and started firing.
John just wasn't as fast as Rodney, so he pulled up his P90 and took position, firing over Sloane. There was a male Wraith and three drones, but they were led by a group of humans. John hit two of the Wraith worshippers before the male raised his weapon and fired.
===-===
Cam felt the jolt of electricity, and then a whiteout--all of his senses on overload, while at the same time he was fine in his own body. It hit again, and this time Cam's body jerked in sympathy at the jolt through John's. A third strike, and then a sudden, strange silence. He could feel John's body lying on the ground, the pressure on his shoulder and the uncomfortable twist of his leg under him. He couldn't feel John at all.
There was no second vision--John's eyes were closed--and the only sound through John's hearing was breathing and shuffling feet. The sense of presence, a knowledge that John was there, even with the wall, was gone.
"Col. Mitchell!" Jefferson said.
Cam felt hollow, frozen. "Sheppard's down," he managed to say. "I think. He was hit by some energy weapon."
"But he's alive?" McKay demanded. "You still have that sensory whatever link?"
# John! # John! #
Silence. "Yeah, but he's unconscious." Cam shook his head to clear it. "The last thing I saw was him shooting at people and Wraith, and then one of them hit him with some pulse weapon."
"A stunner," McKay said. "A stunner is good. Just, if you feel anything like a life-force draining sensation, let me know, because that means they're feeding on him."
Cam felt a shift in sensation. "They're picking him up." There was pressure on his, on John's belly from being thrown over the shoulder of something big. "We can't just let them take him!"
At the same time there was a loud bang against their closed door, followed by another, and then the whine of an energy weapon.
McKay elbowed Cam aside and went to the wall panel, pulling jacks out of his tac vest and plugging in his computer. "I have an idea," he said. "Hold this." McKay shoved the laptop into Cam's hands. "The connectors are too short." Cam held the computer while McKay rapidly typed.
"We have to go after him. What are you doing?"
"Working."
Typical McKay. Cam glanced over to Jefferson, who was wearing an odd expression of tension overlaid with humor. It wasn't everyday a colonel got used as a standing table. Cam shrugged. The banging on the door started again, and Jefferson took a position where he could cover Cam and McKay if the door gave. Cam edged around McKay, between him and the door.
"Hold still!" McKay snapped.'
Cam felt for John while he tried to hold the laptop still. The physical pressure was still there, but Cam pushed harder.
# John #
There was something, and it was wordless. It was John without any of the mental layers, and at Cam's intrusion John's mind swirled in raw anger.
"There!" McKay said. "Every door in the facility is closed. They can't get out and take him anywhere."
"And we're trapped in here," Jefferson said, but before McKay could snap back at him he added, "but you control the doors."
"Right, so if we can time this right, the ones outside our door will be sitting ducks, and you two can shoot to your hearts' content." McKay typed intently, and then took the laptop from Cam, balancing it in one hand. There was another bang on the door. Cam took position opposite Jefferson, P90 at the ready. McKay reached down and undid the catch on the holster of his sidearm. "Ready?" He opened the door.
Cam froze. In front of the door were people, humans, and Jefferson had opened fire. McKay was firing one-handed across the doorway, fear naked in his face but unhesitating. Cam couldn't shoot. They were unarmed, driven by the Wraith behind them. They were innocent.
Jefferson went down with stunner fire, and McKay was yelling at him. Four of the humans were down, and McKay shot a fifth. Cam got hold of himself and fired at the heads of the two drones, looking for the other one, the one in the long coat. Suddenly a leather-clad arm reached out and grabbed the last human standing, pulling him close with a weapon to his head.
"You will come with me, or I will kill him."
The words got into Cam's head, filling him with a sense of protection for the man in the Wraith's grasp, with a knowledge that if he just did what the Wraith said, all would be well. Even the man seemed to know that Cam would take care of him, because he settled into the gripping arm like it was comfort. Cam started to unhook his P90 to set it down, when a shot rang out, and the man screamed while red flowed from his abdomen. "Shoot, damn it!" McKay yelled.
It was like a spell had been broken, and Cam saw the Wraith turn the weapon. He rolled out of the way, landing to bring his gun to bear and fired into the Wraith's head until it dropped. He looked at the bodies on the floor and turned to McKay.
"What just happened?"
"Wraith have some capacity for mind control. I had a feeling it was messing with your brain, limited as it is."
"You just shot an innocent man!" Cam ignored the insult. He felt a darkness creeping into his lungs.
"I just shot a Wraith worshipper!" McKay holstered his gun and started typing one-handed, but Cam could see that his fingers were shaking. "Don't you read our reports?"
He knelt next to Jefferson, feeling for a pulse. He was alive. Cam pulled the P90 from his fingers. "Jefferson just opened fire on those people! Maybe we could have helped them."
"We can't," McKay said, his voice flat.
That brought Cam up. McKay's voice always had something, whether it was scorn, sarcasm or excitement. Cam knew, and he didn't know how he knew, that it meant McKay was feeling something very deeply. It cut through his anger. "That bad?"
McKay nodded, typing. "We need to rescue Col. Sheppard and Cpl. Sloane. I have them trapped about three doors from here. Oh, and I found the room where the machine probably is."
"Everything here was stripped." He put Jefferson on his side, braced so that he wouldn't fall forward. Sometimes people vomited when coming out of having been stunned, so the rule was to leave them in the recovery position.
"It's a hidden room," McKay said. "Right off this one, it so happens. Probably requires the gene or something like that two-person genetic lock on the place where you two got fused."
"Great." Cam looked at the bodies of the humans and the Wraith, and acid taste at the back of his mouth at the smells that came with death. There was an added note of something unfamiliar in the smell, which he thought was probably dead Wraith. It didn't help.
McKay said, "All we have to do is get Sheppard here, and all we have to do in order to do that is get Sheppard free from a bunch of Wraith."
"Don't forget the crazy humans," Cam said, remembering how the man had seemed to relax into the arms of the Wraith pretending he was a hostage. He shivered momentarily, and then to distract himself, he felt for John. There hadn't been a lot of sound, and there hadn't been any change in the sensation on his abdomen. John was still being carried, but the group was quiet.
McKay said, "Look, I can control the doors, open it just enough for you to get your barrel through so you can shoot first and ask questions later."
"No." But even as Cam said it, he knew McKay was right. How fucked up was it that the scientist was calling the tactical shots? "They're unarmed," he said.
"What, you mean these people?" McKay said, gesturing at the bodies on the floor. "Think of them as being armed with Wraith. Besides, for all we know they're hopped up on Wraith energy and stronger than they look."
"How can people--" Cam cut himself off. He could imagine, maybe, what it would be like to have something right in front of you that could control your life, something that had powers and technology you didn't understand. It wouldn't be that hard. "All right. So where are they?"
McKay gestured with his head, and Cam went to look over his shoulder. "I'm going to have to stay here, and we're going to have to use the radios."
"Yeah, well, I don't think silence is going to get us much anymore. They know we're here." He heard the sounds of energy weapons and banging. "And they're trying to get out."
"Right." McKay pointed at a schematic on the screen. "We're here. The room is right on the other side of the back wall. The Wraith are trapped here. You've got two doors, and then the door to the section where I have them. I'm sure they're trying to get out, so we probably have to move. Before you go, can you just do whatever you did in that other facility?"
"Sure." Cam put his hand on the back wall, trying to ignore the racket he could hear through John's ears, and walked, trailing his fingers over the breaks between the panels. Nothing happened.
"Keep going."
He turned the corner and walked toward the next wall. Nothing.
McKay made a face. "Maybe it needs the gene." He handed Cam the laptop on its short leash of cabling, and walked the room, quickly and efficiently. One of the panels lit up faintly as he touched it. "Not enough gene, apparently. I hope the colonel doesn't have to be awake for this to work." He took back the laptop. "Radio me when you get to the doors."
Cam nodded, and stepped over to Jefferson. He took his P90 and extra clips, and his Beretta. "Hang on," he said, swapping out Jefferson's pistol for McKay's. McKay would need every bullet if the Wraith made it past him. "This'll have a few more shots than yours, and if he wakes up, he won't be unarmed."
McKay nodded, but he didn't say anything, then glanced briefly up at Cam with an expression Cam couldn't read. "Are they still working on the door, or have they gotten through?"
"Still working," Cam said. "I can hear an energy weapon on sustained fire."
"Let's do this before they get through," McKay said, his eyes back on the screen. "And Col. Mitchell?"
"Yes?"
McKay glanced at the bodies Cam was going to have to step over, and then briefly up at Cam before focusing again on his screen. "You're going to have to shoot them."
Cam nodded, even though McKay wasn't looking, and clamped his jaw over the smell as he stepped out of the room and up the hall, pausing at one of the Wraith to pick up his weapon. With a stunner, he wouldn't have to kill the people. He reached the first door, which hadn't been evident when they came this way, and radioed McKay. "I'm here."
"Okay. I'm going to practice on this one, so let me know how far it opens," came McKay's voice in his ear.
The door slid open about a foot. "That's big enough for someone skinny to get through. Can you get maybe half that?"
The door slid closed, and then open, about six inches. "How's that?"
Cam knelt with the Wraith weapon up, putting the muzzle through the door, imagining where the people, the Wraith, and John would be. Then he tried it with his P90. "Good as it's gonna get," he said. "Anyone just inside the door is going to be a problem, but we'll burn that bridge when we get to it."
"Anyone ever tell you your colloquialisms aren't exactly comforting, colonel?"
Cam rolled his eyes. He was starting to see why John liked McKay.
"Okay, let me through."
"One more, and then it’s the door where there are."
Cam walked down the corridor, listening to the Wraith and the humans with them, the grunting of the drone who must be the thing making the banging noise on the door. He could smell human fear sweat and something else, bitter, like the smell of a stink bug crushed under your heel on a hot summer day. But these were John's senses. Cam pushed and looked for John, trying to find if there was anything he could reach.
He wasn't good at this. John had been able to put up walls, to control his thoughts. Cam would probably have melted under the Asuran probe.
# come on John # wake up #
He felt a stirring, but it was full of images, most of which didn't make sense--a jail cell made of unfamiliar, almost organic walls; looking at the lens of an old-fashioned TV camera; a rush of sensation and power; a face, malevolent and female and so very Wraith. And with the images came emotions, a tangle of fear and hate and resolve that Cam could barely keep up with, coalescing into a streak of dark that ran through John's center.
# I'm here # it's okay # John # John #
Cam couldn't calm him. Whatever John was feeling, nearly unconscious as he was, threatened to take Cam over. Cam had to pull it together. This was a firefight, even if he hadn't yet pulled the trigger, and he had to clamp down and focus. He could do that.
"Are you at the next door, yet?" McKay said in his ear.
"Yeah." Cam crouched next to the door with the stunner in his hand. If they had John over a shoulder, it would be best to shoot low first. "Go ahead."
The door opened a fraction, and Cam took in the situation as quickly as he could. There were seven humans, one big drone carrying John slung over his shoulder, and another male like the one in the coat he'd killed back at the room with McKay. The male Wraith was at the far end, firing on the door that cut off their exit, and the humans milled about in the stretch of corridor. Cam started firing the stunner, dropping three humans before he was noticed, but the door was suddenly pushed the rest of the way open by a large, clawed hand, and another drone was reaching for him. Cam fired the stunner at the drone, but it had no effect. He barely had time to bring up his P90, and fired into its face and chest. That got the attention of everyone, and the humans turned toward him, moving toward the door with looks on their faces like they would tear him apart.
The stunner was somewhere on the floor, and Cam hesitated with his finger on the P90's trigger. He glanced at John's body, hanging limply over the shoulder of the drone at the far end of the corridor, felt for him, and felt that tangle of emotions settle into a ruthless resolve that Cam barely had time to register before his finger squeezed the trigger. It wasn't a wild spray. He was highly aware of the chance for ricochet, of his ammo, and he kept his shots on the targets. They fell, knocked back by the bullets, spinning from the impact in a shoulder, dropping from a shot to the hip. Cam cleared his path in cold calculation, part of him wondering how he could even pull the trigger.
When the humans were out of the way, he took aim at the male Wraith at the end of the corridor, but before he could fire, the bodies started to get up and come after him. Cam fired at the closest one, but it did nothing, and he could hear the distinct sound of the bullet glancing off the wall.
Wraith could mess with your mind, and it had made him miss his shot. The drone dropped John's body, and Cam felt the impact on his shoulder and side. The drone turned, placing itself between Cam and the male. Having John on the floor made it easier. Cam grabbed the P90 he'd taken from Jefferson, startling at the sound of an energy bolt hitting too close, and opened fire.
He emptied the clip of Jefferson's weapon, watching first the drone twitch with each impact on its torso as it moved toward him, until Cam got his aim up to its head. Then it stumbled over the bodies on the floor and went down. Another energy bolt hit too close, and he let go of Jefferson's weapon and brought up his own, ignoring the shadows at the edge of his vision. He emptied his clip into the male Wraith, but it kept coming at him until it had taken several shots to the head. It went down as a final shot from its energy weapon hit wide.
And then it was quiet.
"Colonel?"
McKay's voice sounded tinny in his ear, and thin. It was the same way Cam felt, looking at the carnage around him. "I'm here."
"Sheppard?"
Cam could still feel John, but he looked toward his body. "He's alive."
"What about Cpl. Sloane?"
"I don't see him. Maybe they dumped him."
"Maybe a lot of things. We need a plan," McKay said. "The Wraith worshippers may be calling in more, and I can't raise anyone on the surface. Maybe it's interference from the doors, I don't know, but it may be just us down here, and it may be our only chance."
"What's the use getting us untangled if we just die down here?" Cam said, picking his way over the bodies to find John. "How long do these Wraith stuns last, anyway?"
"It depends. Col. Sheppard's been shot before. For some reason, the more you get hit by them, the easier it is to come back. Get him back here. We can look for Sloane on the way out. Jefferson isn't moving yet."
Cam rolled John on to his back and felt his neck for a pulse. It was there, regular, even, strong. He pulled John to a sitting position, braced him against the wall, and took the extra clips from his tac vest. He reloaded his P-90 and the one he'd grabbed from Jefferson. John's wasn't hanging from his vest, and his sidearm had been taken, too.
"John."
# John #
He didn't answer, but Cam could feel something, a sense of surfacing. There was no pain, nothing broken.
"I'm here. I've got you."
# I'm here. I've got you. #
Cam knelt down, clipping the P90 in his hands to his belt, and put both hands under John's shoulders, pulling him to a standing position, taking his weight. He could smell John, and it almost felt like an embrace but for the P90 on his vest squeezed between them. He hadn't had to do this for a while, but he remembered how to move both of John's arms to one side of his neck side, get his hand behind John's thigh, bend and lift, using John's sensations to make sure he wasn't causing more pain.
^ lousy dance move ^
Cam felt warmth and cold wash through him, from the feet up. Joy caught in his throat, but he didn't let it sound. He could feel emotion from John, something like what had happened in the Bendrinzi facility after… Cam clamped down on it. John put up the wall. He'd respect it. He carried John down the corridor back to McKay.
# bout time you woke up # can you walk yet? # you're heavy #
^ almost awake ^ they had to hit me three times ^
John sounded proud and amused and very stoned.
^ thanks buddy ^
# that all it is? #
Cam's question slipped out before he could clamp down on it. He could feel John's emotions, and they swirled with too many colors of feeling. Cam sensed a distinct thread of fear that had nothing to do with Wraith, and everything to do with Cam. Maybe he was afraid Cam would try for something more than what they had.
# sorry #
He tried to put the wall back up, but he caught an image from John that shocked him, of John on his back, legs up, and Cam--Cameron, the full name was distinct--fucking him.
Cam staggered under the combined weight of John and desire, and a distant sense memory of something he'd never done, but he still wasn't sure he had an answer.
He stood for a long moment, walling himself off from John's mind as best he could, concentration on John's sensation of being carried, the tingling in his limbs Cam recognized as the sign of recovery from stunner fire.
McKay's voice in his ear startled him. "Colonel, do you have him? Is he all right?"
Even through the earpiece Cam could hear McKay's fear and concern. Maybe John had kept things light with him because he had a thing with McKay. Cam didn't answer. They were a few paces away, and he picked his way over the Wraith and human bodies to enter the room.
"Oh, thank God," McKay said.
Cam walked over to where Jefferson lay, and knelt to gently lower John's body to the ground so he could sit up propped against the wall. Freed of the weight, he stood and stretched. "I think he's okay."
"Would you-- Here, take this," McKay said, thrusting the laptop toward Cam, and hurrying over to John. "Colonel?"
John opened his eyes, and Cam closed his, because it was too weird to look at the back of McKay's head and his face at the same time.
"Hey, buddy.John looked up at Rodney, smiling a little loopily, and Cam could feel the relief wash over John. "Where are we? Where's Sloane and Jefferson? Have you heard from Teyla and Ronon?"
"We don't know where Sloane is," Cam said from where he stood, his eyes still closed. "Jefferson's here, stunned. The Wraith and the people with them, " and here Cam couldn't stop the wave of regret. He swallowed and continued, "They're all dead."
"I have us locked down," McKay said, "but I found the room. This is it. Whatever the lab is, it's in a room hidden off this one. And we can't raise Rodrigues and Sherman. If there are more out there, we don't know, but I shut doors between us and the entrance."
"Rodney, slow down." John worked himself to his feet, swaying slightly, but Cam could feel the strength and control coming back to John's limbs. "You say the room is in here?"
"Yes."
A noise from Jefferson caught their attention, and John went over to him. "Back in the land of the living?"
"Yes, sir," Jefferson slurred, pushing himself to a sitting position. "About how long was I out?"
"Not quite an hour," McKay said.
"Seemed like longer." Cam looked up at that, then regretted it, but he forced himself to keep his eyes open. He and Sheppard had to figure out how to do this.
"They're always shorter than you think." He turned back to Jefferson. "How you doing?"
"Not my first brain fry," Jefferson said. "Other than the headache, I'll be fine in a few minutes. Gets faster every time."
"How many times have you been shot?" Cam asked, unclipping Jefferson's P90 from his belt and holding it out
"Six?" Jefferson said, leveraging himself to his feet with a grunt and taking back his weapon and one full clip. "Heck, it takes six or eight hits to even slow Ronon down."
"All this is very nice, gentlemen," Rodney said, "but you have to figure out how to get into that room. This is the panel." He had unhooked his computer from the other wall, and was still holding it one handed when he reached out. The panel lit up with Ancient writing. "I need to translate this. You touch it," he said to John. John touched the panel, running his fingers along the edges while Rodney stepped back to look at it. "I hate the Ancients," he said after a moment.
"What does it say?" John asked.
McKay recited, "When I hold your true love, you cannot see me. When you look into my face, I shall never lie. When you are not here, I am empty. I will tell you the truths you cannot deny."
"It's the same riddle the giant asked me," Cam said. "It's a mirror."
"Mirror?" John said.
"The answer to the riddle. Let's try something," Cam said. He walked over to John. "You take one side, I'll take the other."
"You don't have the gene," McKay said.
"Won't matter," Cam said.
Cam and John faced each other, and it was like looking in a mirror, because they could each see their own face. Cam's eyebrows were drawn together, and John's face was carefully neutral, and Cam could feel the thick cord of John's self-control. Cam reached up with his left hand, moving John's right at the same time until John got the hint, and they placed their palms on the panel next to him.
"The writing changed," McKay said.
John looked into Cam's face, hiding his feelings as best he could, wondering what was behind the crease in Cam's forehead. Cam was hiding himself as well.
"I got it," McKay said, "but it makes even less sense. I offer this my sacrifice--"
"We got it," John and Cam said together, cutting him off.
^ to him ^ most precious ^
John could barely even think it.
# most precious in my eyes #
Cam spoke the entire rhyme aloud in Ancient, as Jackson had taught him, even remembering the rising inflection on sia. Nothing happened.
John looked away from Cam's face, but he looked toward the floor. Cam did, too. Both their heart rates were going up, and keeping their walls intact was almost impossible, with too many thoughts to keep some from spilling over. John swallowed. "Jefferson? You ready to move?"
"Yes, sir."
"McKay, are the doors to the outside still closed?"
McKay plugged his laptop back in to the wall panel. "Yes."
"You and Jefferson go find Sloane. Mitchell and I will work this out."
"I'm not leaving you, Sheppard."
"Rodney," John said. "Find Sloane. Radio when you're on your way back." John looked up at Rodney, who glanced at the writing and then back at John's face. His eyes moved to Cam, widening slightly. Cam and John both felt a cold wave.
# he knows #
^ genius ^
McKay, turning pale, turning away, said, "Right. Sloane. We can do that. Come on, private."
McKay put his laptop back on the Velcro on the back of his tac vest, checked his Beretta, and left with one last look at John. He nodded once, tightly, and John had no idea what he meant, but he nodded back.
# we can't # not here #
^ not so much ^
# but it doesn't work # DNA issue? #
John stepped forward, his mouth dry, and his brain stuttering. He couldn’t think about this.
^ I'm sorry ^
# for what #
John took Cam's face in his hands and pressed his lips to Cam's, so chaste and gentle that Cam wasn't even sure what this was about, why there would be an apology. He parted his lips under John's, and John pulled back a fraction, took a breath.
And took down the wall.
The kiss deepened, became almost wild, but it was a bare physical reflection of two minds. Cam felt the dark streak again, the ruthlessness Cam realized he had borrowed to shoot his way through the Wraith worshippers, and John shared Cam's grief at the memory of pulling the trigger, and knew he never would have felt it on his own.
Each, together, they were known. They could hide nothing. Their arms moved, touching the same ways, right hands sliding down left flanks, left hands spread across the back of the head. There was fear and joy and all of the self-loathing, guilt, and drive. There were no lies. Not even to themselves.
Cam was the first to pull back.
# that's why you're silent #
^ that's why you talk so much ^
Given what they were feeling, what they had learned, what they knew, such a trivial summary took off some of the weight and let them pull apart, at least a little. They leaned with their foreheads together.
# truth you cannot deny #
^ both may live if one might die ^
They kissed again, gently, unnecessarily.
# is this going to be like that Star Trek movie where Bones has Spock in his head? #
John threw back his head and laughed, desperate and on the edge. There was nothing else he could do.
They placed their palms on the panel again, and the entire wall slid up.
===-===
They found Sloane. Rodney swallowed and Jefferson cursed at the sight of the husk. There was no telling why they'd killed him and taken John. Rodney didn't have much hope for Rodrigues and Sherman. Teyla and Ronon would be fine, he told himself, but he wasn't sure he believed it. He clicked his radio. "Colonel, we found him." There was no answer. "Colonel?" He looked at Jefferson.
"I'll put the body where we can pick it up on the way out," he said, bending and lifting the husk like a child.
Rodney nodded. There was nothing else that he could do. They made their way back to the room where they'd left Sheppard and Mitchell, and Rodney tried not to think about the rhyme, or the meaning, or the look on Mitchell's face. He just hoped to hell they'd both be there, because he hadn't liked that line about both living if one died. It was just too damn Star Trek.
They paused to set Sloane's body down, and Rodney tried his radio again. "Sheppard?" Still no answer. He glanced at Jefferson, and they both took off at a run, making their way over the bodies outside the door, and skidding to a halt as they entered. The back wall of the room was gone, opening into a laboratory that rivaled Janus's secret lab on Atlantis. Sheppard and Mitchell stood in front of one of the consoles, each with a hand on a raised oblong, and each staring straight ahead. Rodney could see a mirror behind the console, and he was careful not to step where he would be reflected.
Under their hands the raised, white oblongs swirled with light and energy. Between them the comb was inserted like a lock in a key. Why couldn't they have waited for him? Why did they have to just rush in and do this without letting him analyze the equipment first?
The laboratory was full of interesting-looking consoles, but Rodney ignored them, focusing on Sheppard and Mitchell. Their chests rose and fell in perfect synch, and they blinked in unison. They stood there for several long moments, and then the lights of the console went out, and Sheppard and Mitchell moved, Sheppard shaking his head, and Mitchell rubbing his eyes with one hand.
"Colonels?" Rodney said.
"We're…" Sheppard started.
"It's done."
Rodney was no judge of people, he knew that, but even he could tell that they looked hollowed out. If the rhyme meant anything, if Sheppard's look as he asked him leave to find Sloane meant anything, Mitchell and Sheppard were together together even before this stupid Ancient thing happened. How would it feel to be that close to the person you loved, to the point of living in their head, and then be alone? He'd been relieved to have Cadman out of his head, because they'd never really liked each other, but even that had left him oddly lonely.
"Colonel, we have to go. Sloane…"
"They got Sloane," Sheppard said. Rodney nodded, and he watched Sheppard snap together. "We don't know what happened out front. We need to open the door to the outside, and see if there are Wraith on the other side, and work an exit strategy from there." Rodney nodded again.
Jefferson took the weapons from the Wraith, and checked his clip. Sheppard and Mitchell checked their weapons, Mitchell as buttoned down under his game face as Sheppard. Sheppard led the way, Jefferson bringing up the rear. They came to the door where Mitchell had ambushed the group that had John. Rodney said, "I should be able to open the far door from here, and if we have company, I can shut this one."
"Do it," Sheppard said.
Rodney opened a panel and hooked up his laptop. Sheppard and Jefferson took positions at the end of a corridor that was already full of dead Wraith and their worshippers.
Rodney had everything ready. He flattened himself as much as he could against the wall. "Door in three, two, one." He hit the command, and tensed, waiting for the gunfire. It didn’t come. Jefferson and Sheppard went into the next section of corridor. Rodney peered after them.
"Clear," Sheppard said.
Rodney unhooked his laptop. That was the last door he had closed, and they should be able to get out from here. Jefferson started back to get Sloane's body, but Mitchell was already picking it up. "I got him," he said.
"Thank you sir, but if it's all the same to you?" Jefferson held out his arms, and Mitchell placed the body in it, murmuring, "Of course."
Rodney heard Sheppard in the radio and ahead. "Sherman, Rodrigues, come in."
Rodney held his breath, and let it out when he heard, "Sir?" in answer. "Are we glad to hear from you."
"SITREP," Sheppard said.
"Six drones, two males and fourteen bugheads went in after you."
"We met them," Sheppard said. They're no longer a problem."
"Good to hear it, sir, because we couldn’t come in after you."
"What happened?"
"You're never going to believe this, sir, but there's a dragon."
"Oh," Sheppard said, "I believe it. Let's see if it lets us out."
"We'll look for you, sir."
"Dragon?" Rodney said.
Cam said, "There was one on the Bendrinzi world. It trapped Sheppard inside. Some kind of Ancient hologram, but with real fire. I was the only one it let through."
Rodney saw Sheppard and Cam share a look. Sheppard turned away and tapped his radio. "Jumper ready? Have you heard from the gate?"
"Yes, sir, and DelCastillo checked in on schedule. Shave and a haircut. All clear."
At least something was going right. Rodney steeled himself for the next thing Sheppard would say. He'd had to say it too many times.
"Thanks, but we have some bad news. Please prep a body bag for Cpl. Sloane."
"Understood."
They walked through the corridors, and made it to the opening. Rodney could see the nimbus of a force field or hologram, or maybe both, from what Sherman had said. Sheppard stopped and pulled something from his pocket and threw it. There was a bright light and a zapping sound, and the head of a dragon formed.
"Seriously?" Rodney said. "After all that we're trapped by a force field shaped like a fantastic beast? This galaxy is so not fair." He bitched by habit, and had already started looking along the walls, trying to find something to show where the generator was.
"Hang on," Mitchell said, and walked forward. The dragon's head opened its mouth, forked tongue extending through Col. Mitchell, scanning him, Rodney realized. "John," Mitchell called, then corrected himself, "Sheppard."
Sheppard stepped forward. Rodney didn't know what would happen, but he had to distract Jefferson from seeing anything, if there was going to be anything to be seen. Him most precious to my eyes could only have one meaning. He muttered, "I have no idea what he sees in him," and turned to Jefferson, with no idea what he was about to say, so he started with the first thing that popped into his head. "Thank you for your fine work, private." Jefferson looked up at him, eyes widening for a moment. "Seriously, you did good work down there, figuring out how the Wraith knew we were there and then, you know, shooting things."
"McKay! Jefferson! Come on. Coast is clear."
"Great," Rodney said, relieved. Who knows what Sheppard and Mitchell had to do to open the laboratory, much less turn off the dragon force field? At least now no one else would know. "So, yes, well, you shooting things and me opening doors. I'd say we did pretty well."
Jefferson just looked at him, and then glanced down to his burden. Rodney felt his stomach open up, and his heart fall into it. "Yes, well. Other than the loss." Jefferson stalked past him, taking Sloane's body to the jumper. Through the doorway Rodney could see the body bag already laid out. He took a moment to gather himself. They had stepped over so many bodies to get here, and he'd forgotten, hadn't even seen what was in front of him, so intent on protecting Sheppard. "I'm sorry," he said to Jefferson's broad back, and to Sloane's husk.
In his ear he heard Sheppard radioing Ronon on guard at the gate, and the relief in hearing Ronon answer. He swallowed back his shame, it was too familiar a feeling, and concentrated on having Sheppard safe and back to normal, and decided he was angry at Sheppard for putting him in the position of having to protect him.
===-===
John sat in his room, alone for the first time in days. There had been the debrief, the trip through medical, and an awkward moment in the corridor with Cam, interrupted, saved, by Ronon inviting Cam to run with them in the morning, and Cam begging off.
His door signaled. John glanced at the clock. It was 0:37. His money was on Rodney or Cam.
It was Rodney. "Kind of late, isn't it, McKay?" John stepped aside to keep from being bowled over as Rodney walked in.
"Look, Sheppard, I, I mean, I come from a civilized country, so this isn't really an issue for me, but I understand how your stupid military rules work, but if you have feelings for that Neanderthal and his stupid lemon, I really, I mean, it doesn't matter, and I'll do anything I need to to keep you from having any problems with it. I mean I don't know what you had to do to get through the dragon at the end, or to get that wall to Janus's yet another lab to open up, but I distracted Jefferson so he wouldn't see, and then I put my foot in it, because there he is holding what's left of Cpl. Sloane, and--"
"Rodney, breathe." John knew that Rodney knew. That it wasn't even about him and Cam right now, but he let Rodney pretend it was. "I trust you."
"I know, I just, well, actually you never trusted me with this before now."
"Rodney, I don't talk about this kind of thing. Ever," John said, putting finality into the word, and hoping Rodney took the hint. "But thanks."
Rodney looked at him, tired, with dark eyes over his stubbly cheeks. "And that's why you never see it coming? With women, I mean."
"Yeah, pretty much."
"Well, that explains a lot."
"I'm sure it does. Good night, Rodney."
At the door, Rodney turned. "Can we go back there? I didn't get to look at the rest of the lab."
"Sure thing. If we can get past the dragon, and keep the locals from calling the Wraith. Good night."
"Good night, colonel."
John sat back down on his bed. He had no idea what Cam was going to do next, which he thought was ironic, considering they were just in each others' heads, that they knew each other's strengths and weaknesses and deepest fears. The mirror at the end had left nothing hidden.
===-===
"Col. Sheppard, Dr. McKay, welcome to Stargate Command." The words were formal, Landry's face a bland mask.
"Happy to be here, sir," Sheppard said, carefully not looking for Cam.
"General O'Neill and the IOA are waiting in the briefing room. I see you have the artifacts from Janus's secret lab."
"Which one?" Rodney muttered, but John hefted the case in his hand, and nodded toward Rodney, who held an identical hard-shell briefcase.
"Let's get started then."
===-===
John stretched out on his bunk in the visitors' quarters. It had been a long day with the IOA, but the small time dilation device had made them very happy, and justified the science budget for Atlantis for the next year. He was planning to nap for a few minutes, and grab dinner at the commissary. He wasn't pleased at the knock on his door. Rodney probably wanted to go down now. He got up. It wasn't Rodney.
"Hey." Cam Mitchell stood there in civvies. "Want to get a burger, or a real pizza?"
John swallowed. This was the first time they’d seen each other since he'd gone back to the Milky Way through the gate. He'd ignored Cam's emails, feeling guilty for what he'd imposed on Cam, feeling sure that Cam wouldn't want him after seeing everything inside John's head, the dark streak that he hid because he was afraid of it himself. He'd seen all of Cam's corners, all of Cam's truth, and as far as he was concerned, Cameron Mitchell was the better man. The emails, which had never been frequent, but had trailed off, unanswered. John wanted to beg off, did not want to deal, but heard himself saying, "Pizza would be good."
"Well, get out of that dress stuff, and let's go."
It was like a dozen times before, but John felt a weight with every word. "Give me a sec." He closed the door, and changed, trying not to think about what would happen besides pizza.
He followed Cam up, out through the guard posts, and into his Mustang, like they'd done before. Cam talked about nothing and everything, catching John up on sports, including golf, which John knew Cam didn't play or watch. They pulled out of the parking lot, and Cam opened it up, pressing John back in his seat with the acceleration. "Gotta beat the delivery guy."
They were going to his house, not some place neutral, and John felt his jaw go even more tense, if that were possible. The timing was a near thing, and they pulled into the parking lot just after the car with the delivery sign. Cam paid the guy in the parking lot, and took the pizza upstairs, John following on autopilot.
He followed Cam's lead, accepting a beer and a plate with two slices, sitting in front of the TV. Cam went for the remote, saying, "You are not going to believe this game. I saved it for you." And there was football on the screen, Denver behind until the fourth quarter, with too many near misses, and then a small mistake from the Patriots, and the Broncos turn it around in two minutes. "Depending on your point of view, that was a great game, or a terrible game," Cam said, picking up their plates. "You want another?"
"I'm good." John still had half a beer.
"Yeah, I know," Cam said, his grin not a leer because John didn’t think Cameron Mitchell could be sleazy if his life depended on it. And it wasn't a matter of thinking, but of knowing, because the mirror tells the truth. John was still dealing with some of the truths.
And that kind of casual joke was the kind of thing Cam would have said, before, and it would have been the first step toward ending up in the bedroom, before. John doesn’t know if he can do it, now.
Cam must have seen the look on his face, because he came around the coffee table, and sat down on it, facing John. "Talk to me."
It was the last thing John wanted to do.
"There's not much I don't already know. That the problem?" John looked down and shook his head. "C'mon."
John snorted. There was no way out of this. "When we were, you know." He gestured between the two of them. "You could see. Feel. What I--" He knew it was coming out all wrong, but he wasn't sure he could do this. He was almost ashamed. "We were just. This." He opened his hand, the gesture meaning the pizza, the beer, and the game. "Easy. No pressure. It wasn't supposed to-- You weren't supposed to know--"
"But I do," Cam said.
"Yeah. And what happened. What, I mean-- It seemed like both, but it was me. I mean, you didn't. Until." John was forcing words out, but he was sure they weren't the right ones
"Stop."
John looked up. Cam leaned back on his hands and cocked his head to one side. "Let me see if I can translate here. You think that what I think I feel is because I got it from you?"
John nodded, relieved to be understood, and ready to let this grief be final. He'd been mourning the loss of Cam for months.
"John, let me ask you something. You love McKay like a brother, right?"
"More than," John said, thinking about David, and how little they shared in common. McKay was more than that, but then John realized how Cam might take his words, so he added, "I mean like family. My own brother…"
"Yeah, I remember that," Cam said. "You guys don't get along. Point being, now I can see why McKay's family to you, but I still don't like the guy. Get what I'm saying?"
John looked up. Cam had a smile starting, like it was shy and unsure of its welcome. "You mean you…?"
"Son, I didn't think this was anything more to you, and I didn't want to blow it." Cam grinned, blushing faintly. "Well, not that way. So I kept my mouth shut. Well, that's to say I didn't say anything, which was easy when my mouth was busy."
John felt like something was falling off him, leaving his arms and legs suddenly lighter. It took him a minute to identify the feeling, but then he realized he was pulling apart an armor he didn't remember making. And wasn’t that always the way of things with him? Things were clearer, always, in hindsight. Still, he didn't look at Cam when he said, "So we're good?"
"We've always been good, and we're going to get better." Cam stood up from his perch on the table and reached out. John took his hand and let Cam pull him up into the narrow space between the couch and the coffee table. Cam leaned in and kissed John's neck. "I learned about something you like."
John bent to open his neck, to offer trust, and when Cam kissed up his neck and along his jaw to his lips, he could let himself feel, let himself remember that sense of being intertwined without the fear of thinking he'd forced it.
And an hour later, when his legs were around Cameron's back with him finally, fully inside, and John trembling under him, Cam said, almost breathless, "I wish we'd done this when I could feel what you feel."
John couldn't answer, not in words, but he knew that Cam wanted to hear that everything was okay. Better than okay. But Cam accepted his silence, and started to move, staring down at John, so that he had to close his eyes, to hide. And then all he could do was feel every perfect thrust, the warmth of Cameron above and the ghosts of his breath. There was no hiding from that, and John let go, and opened his throat in wordless pleasure. "That's it," Cam said. "Tell me what you need." But everything John needed, Cam gave him.
After, when they lay twined together, Cam said, "I figured out what the legend was. The whole true love and dragon thing was kind of a red herring."
John had almost forgotten. Cam had lived through the fairy tale stuff while John had just waited for rescue. "What was it?"
"Cupid and Psyche. Know the story?"
John did, but he said, "Tell me about it."
"A king has to sacrifice his daughter to a winged monster, and he does, but she ends up in a magic palace with a great husband she can't ever look at."
"Like the Beauty and the Beast palace?" John knew the story, but he wanted to see where Cam took it.
"Right, but she sleeps with him every night, and it's good, you know, but she doesn't really know who or what he is. So her mother convinces her to light a candle or lantern in the night. And he's not a monster, but Cupid, and he's beautiful."
"Not sure I'm following this." John ran his fingers through the hair on Cam's chest.
"Not sure I'm telling it right. The point is, once she sees him, he has to cast her out, and all sorts of crap happens before they can get back together."
"She was beautiful enough to rival the goddesses," John said, "and the prophecy was that she would marry a winged monster. The monster was Cupid, and he threw her out because she didn't trust him."
"So you've read it?"
"Yeah, but which one of us is which?" John asked. "We both fly."
"But you're so damned pretty."
John reached up and batted at Cam's head, and then sat up, arms around his knees. He felt Cam's hand on his back, and for a moment his left palm felt warm. Before he could stop it, he said, "I missed you."
"Me, too. And I trust you," Cam said.
"Even after--" John gestured at his head, not saying, Even after you saw who I really am.
"Son, we got the candle of a lifetime. I've seen you. So, yeah, even after. Especially after."
They were quiet for a moment, and John said, "I'm not, you know, exactly romantic."
Cam snorted. "Ya' think?" John didn't say anything else, and eventually Cam said, "Nothing has to change. It can all be like tonight. I'm not looking for rings and declarations, son." John felt the shift in the bed as Cam sat up and wrapped his arms around John, chest warm on John's back. "I got better than that." Cam rubbed a hand across John's head, and kissed the back of his neck. "It'll be just like it was, only better."
John leaned back into Cam's arms. The echoes of Cam's mind hadn't completely faded, and John knew for all the easy warmth in Cam's voice, those words had been hard for him to say, an effort to try to get it right. He took a breath, and turned, pushing Cam back and stretching out over him, skin on skin.
"I know."