Cedarfiction.net - Deliverance

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Act 4

Sheppard's breathing was laboured as he tried to get up from the bench and McKay hurried to his side.

"Easy?" Sheppard rasped, pulling his arm from McKay's grasp. "I've been easy almost from the minute we came aboard this miserable Hive, and now I think it's way past time we knew what's going on!"

"Well," McKay glanced toward the door and then looked down to the floor for a moment as he considered the changed cadence of the vibrations he could feel coming from the deck plating. Finally, he offered, "We've dropped out of hyperspace."

"Congratulations, Genius," Sheppard answered, his voice was heavy with sarcasm. "How long did it take for you to work that out?"

"You don't have any of the answers, McKay," Sheppard snapped, "You haven't even been able to pick up a single lousy breadcrumb from the computer about where we're going or what Todd's working on with Keller, beside the cure for the fucking retrovirus!"

Sheppard threw out his arms as if to underline that he referred to the transformation that was still little more than halted in its tracks in spite of alleged efforts to reverse its effects.

"Erm, hello," McKay spat the vitriol of bitter sarcasm at Sheppard in return. "I told you, this is Todd's ship. He knows how I work. We've worked together. He's protected every vulnerability I know how to exploit."

"Oh, come on, McKay." Sheppard leaned heavily against a console and McKay gave a moment's thought to going to help him. "You're the man. You can get around his… Wraith Kung Fu."

Sheppard was about to argue when the door behind him opened and Jennifer's voice sounded, shrill with concern.

Before he could answer, one of her hands closed around his arm and her other arm came to rest supportively across his lower back. She began to lead him back towards the low cot.

"Jennifer," he protested, "I'm fine, honestly, and I can't just… lie around here—"

A burst of gut-wrenching fire knotted around his belly, belying his words as he all but doubled over.

"Fine, huh?" Keller demanded, supporting him as she lowered him back down to the relative softness of the cot. "John, I know this is frustrating for you, but I promise you, Todd is working to find a way to neutralise this and—"

"Where?" Sheppard cut her off, trying by sheer force of will to banish the pain. "Haven't seen him for weeks."

"He's still… running back and forth between ships," Keller answered, "And when he's back here…"

"What are you two working on?" he asked, still frowning, perhaps more deeply as she began bustling into action, checking his pulse and preparing another dose of whatever serum Todd had them pumping into him. "Jennifer?"

"What?" she started, as if she had been miles away. "Oh, the problem of the Hoffan Syndrome, mostly."

"It's a syndrome now?" Sheppard asked. He watched the way she carefully avoided stretching too far; carried herself as if in protection of some injury he couldn't see.

Sheppard felt relieved that he wasn't the only one that had noticed something was amiss when McKay cut in with the question.

"You know, if Todd is mistreating you," Sheppard added, meaning to suggest that he could have a word with their Wraith host.

"No, no, no," Jennifer said hurriedly. "I'm fine, he's fine – just… busy working."

"Jennifer," Sheppard said, and there was a warning in his voice that managed also to convey his concern. "If there's something going on…"

"John," Jennifer said. She wanted to tell him she was fine, that there was nothing wrong, but a prickling heat rushed in behind her eyes and she ended up fighting unshed tears that suddenly threatened to overwhelm her; drag her down into the murky depths of her acquiescent complicity and drown her in it. Instead of reassuring Sheppard, she gasped, "I can't—"

"Ah, Doctor Keller," Todd's voice, already sounding from half way into the room had her all but jump to her feet and try to move away from the colonel, only Sheppard caught her hand, keeping her near. "My Second informed me that I might find you here."

She didn't miss the displeased, possessive glint burning in his golden eyes, and quickly disengaged Sheppard's touch from her hand. Todd continued as though nothing were wrong.

"No, everything is not all right," Sheppard snapped before she could answer, and in spite of his obvious pain, he sat up, climbed to his feet and put himself between her and Todd. He wavered slightly, but continued unabated. "A member of my team is being kept in isolation from her companions, is obviously unhappy and—"

Jennifer almost panicked when she saw Todd's face darken, the anger she had come to recognise now clear in his eyes.

"John," she said, laying a brief touch onto his arm before moving around him to come nearer to Todd's side. "Please, you need to rest." To Todd, she added, "I have concerns that John's not responding to the counter-serum as he should be."

"Indeed," Todd purred, and took a step toward Sheppard. Sheppard glared at him, not backing down in the face of Todd's intimidating stride. With equal but soft menace, he said, "John Sheppard, I can assure you that Doctor Keller is being afforded every respect due to her position." Jennifer did not miss the challenge, or the implied threat in his voice as he went on. "I thought you understood that the location of her quarters was merely a matter of convenience."

"Cut the crap, Todd," Sheppard said harshly. "We both know there's more going on than that!"

"Do we?" Todd rumbled, his golden eyes fixed, Jennifer saw, on the angry blue of Sheppard's own. After another moment, however, as if shrugging off the challenge to his authority, Todd spread his arms.

"Either way," he said more brightly, "We have arrived at our destination and I believe here may be the answer to a multitude of our questions; the solution to many of our problems."

Surprising Jennifer, Todd abruptly turned his attention from Sheppard to face McKay, who had inched his way closer to her. The Canadian scientist stood almost at her shoulder.

"We are currently in a geo-stationary orbit around a planet far outside of the network of portals, and—"

"I assure you, Doctor, I rarely joke about such matters," Todd growled softly in answer. "We are here because I believe we will find those answers of which I spoke in an abandoned facility belonging to the one you call Michael."

"Whoa, whoa, whoa!" Sheppard took a step forward and planted a hand squarely against Todd's chest.

Todd looked first at her, then at Sheppard, before pointedly lowering his gaze to the colonel's hand splayed against the leather of his coat until Sheppard removed the touch. He answered none of them.

Keller's mind was racing. Of course it made perfect sense on the one hand, to seek answers from the demesne of the one who had unleashed the Hoffan Syndrome on the Pegasus galaxy, on the other…

Todd merely growled softly and the knot in the pit of Jennifer's belly tightened.

"You know as well as we do that he puts in a failsafe at all of his facilities," McKay protested, "besides which, if this is an abandoned facility, he would already have destroyed any data left behind. He's… even more paranoid than you in—"

"This place isn't quite as abandoned as you want us to believe," Sheppard accused.

"Mmm, I may have… exaggerated a little in that regard," Todd said, his voice almost sing-song in quality, but the tension in the room increased exponentially, and Jennifer wanted nothing more than to turn tail and run back to the lab.

Todd's patience finally snapped, as Jennifer expected it would and he roared at Sheppard.

"Yes," Sheppard said, his own voice, behind the strain of his discomfort, overly patient, in counterpoint to the Wraith's.

"Then I require Doctor McKay's assistance, and time is something of which we have very little!"

"All right," McKay said, and behind her, Jennifer felt him take another step closer, before his hand gently brushed against the small of her back.

It was supposed to be a supportive gesture, she knew, but against the backdrop of the barely contained tempers and the tension in the atmosphere, it only added to her disquiet. Subtly she moved away, retreating to put herself level with the man. She gave him a wan smile and tried to cover by saying, "Just try not to get us blown up this time, huh?"

The Hive Second sat perfectly still but for the slow, measured breaths that brought the steady rise and fall of his chest. Had anyone entered his quarters they might have mistaken him for a perfectly sculpted example of a Wraith statue.

His eyes were fixed on the figure occupying his bed. She lay unmoving, finally at rest after several days of fevered pain through which he had alternately nursed her, and smothered her mind under the pressure of his own into a healing lack of consciousness when his duties took him elsewhere.

His mind was nowhere near as still. He constantly reviewed and shifted pieces of information from many sources, as if trying to assemble a jigsaw puzzle. The latest pieces of his puzzle came from the young worshipper he had interrogated. The former Wraith scientist had made her take a sample of his blood and had instructed her in the use of imaging equipment. Why? Did he think to instruct the human in the reversal of what the Queen's Scientist had wrought on his body? Certainly the creature had fought the transformation; fought being returned to what he had once been.

He kept his thoughts to himself, but was curious as to why the young human woman that had been so cruelly brought to this creature, with no more intention than to be something on which he could feed – unusual in itself that the Queen's scientist had chosen a woman for such a task – had developed such feelings of sympathy, beyond the instruction she had clearly been given to see to the creature's needs. He could only conclude that the Queen's scientist had another agenda in mind where his former rival was concerned, but what, and where was that scientist now?

Movement from his bed drew his mind back to the moment, and he rose smoothly to his feet to cross the room to where his body servant was stirring. Carefully he lowered himself to sit on the side of the bed, and reached out a long fingered hand to brush back the tangle of hair from her face, almost tenderly running his fingers down her cheek afterwards.

"Lord?" she whispered as she woke, her voice broken by the obvious dryness in her throat.

For a moment he closed his eyes and breathed out slowly, memory rushing in hard on the heels of her words.

"Tell me something," he asked into the silence between them before he opened his eyes.

"Anything," she said, and he could hear the emotion, her devotion to him, clear in her voice.

"If I were to bring you to the laboratory of the Queen's former scientist, to bring you to him there; if I were to order you to give yourself to him; allow him to feed on you; see to his care; if you were… witness to his torture; to the breaking of his spirit, how would you comport yourself?"

Opening his eyes he saw that she was struggling to try and sit, and reached out to assist her, closing his fingers around her arms as she swayed with the after effects of the illness and the drugs he had given her to counter her fever and pain.

Forgetting herself, Isla leaned against her master, her fingers trembling against his chest, feeling the beat of his heart clearly against her touch through the shirt he wore.

"I don't… understand, Lord," she said softly, raising her face just enough to be able to see his strong jaw. "I would do as you commanded – always."

He drew her back and reached to tilt her head back still further so that her eyes met with the deep gold of his. She gasped softly, reading the mixed emotions she saw there, after so many years of knowing him as she did, seeing as perhaps only she would have seen.

"Has some worshipper disobeyed you, Lord?" she asked softly. She did not wish to disturb the closeness with anything, so rare were these moments, and so cherished.

"No, Isla," he answered softly, "I was curious to understand the motivations of the girl assigned by the Queen's Scientist to… serve the prisoner he has made of the former Wraith."

"Young, you say?" She did not remember him telling her this, but had a feeling of certainty of the truth of it.

The Hive Second smiled, softly, and perhaps she saw a little sadness in his eyes, before he answered, "No, I did not say."

Isla blushed, and started to draw herself away from her master. She had crossed a line again – unwittingly perhaps, unintentionally certainly – in drawing an impression from his mind. Sorrow descended over her, like a mist rolling in from the sea at evening and she closed her eyes, shutting out the sight of him.

"Then perhaps it was empathy alone that moved her," she said, trying to keep the gathering sob from her voice. "And youth that prevented her from knowing any better."

"Isla, look at me," he commanded softly, and trembling she took down her hand and opened her eyes. "Have I ever once forbidden it?"

Even before she nodded, he had gathered her closer still, and lay them both down in the warmth of his bed. Isla sighed, a single tear dropping to stain the shirt he had yet to remove.

Jennifer couldn't help but wince at the sound of the Darts flying overhead as they approached the settlement from the landed transport ship that had brought her, Todd, McKay and a number of drones down to the surface of the planet.

The land around them was hilly, and greenish brown grasses and shrub-land stood between them and their destination and the Darts stirred up clouds of obscuring dust as they flew, low level, culling beams setting down Wraith soldiers to begin subduing whatever resistance these people gave to Todd's invasion party. It stirred feelings of nausea in Jennifer to be a part of that – even by association.

As they advanced, the drones surrounding Jennifer moved closer, tightening the defensive shield they made for her, and she could not help but glare up ahead, her eyes boring into the middle of Todd's back, where he strode onward, Doctor McKay almost jogging to keep up with him. How dare Todd treat her as though she were something to be guarded; protected at all costs… as though she could not take care of herself – and she had no doubt that was what he was doing.

"Why the hell is all this necessary anyway?" she demanded, wondering if the sound of her voice would even penetrate through the wall of drones. "I thought we were supposed to be coming here to get into one of Michael's facilities."

Todd abruptly stopped walking, as did the drones, and Jennifer would have collided with the one in front of her, had he not sidestepped to allow his commander access.

"Look around you, Doctor Keller," he purred as he stepped right up to her, causing her to step back. "Tell me what you see."

"I see… grass, and trees and shrugs… and I see a village being attacked by Wraith and—"

Todd growled and stepped forward again, into the circle of drones. Jennifer had nowhere to go, so raised her hands defensively. Todd was so close they came to rest against his chest and she pushed against him, ineffectual as she could not hope to match his physical presence with her human strength. He reached up to cup her elbows in his grasp and she moaned softly…

"Have a care, Jennifer," he rumbled as he leaned closer. "One of these days you will go too far and—"

"And you'll what?" Jennifer, angered in spite of the arousal of fear inside of her, pushed against his chest, trying to move him. Continuing she hissed, "Decide I'm too much trouble and feed on me?"

"We are… allies," he purred as if amused by her anger, and she shivered at the way he made the word sound as though he had said something else entirely. "Feeding on you would be counterproductive. Besides—"

It took McKay several moments before he realised that the striding Wraith was no longer beside him. He skidded to a halt, twisting his head around to try and see his companions – if he dare call them that.

The overhead whine of the Darts was less pronounced now, as if the pattern or purpose of their flight had somehow changed, and he could hear no gunfire from up ahead, within the settlement. He could only conclude that whatever resistance Todd had expected did not exist.

Finally McKay turned around in time to see Todd step closer to Jennifer, grasping her arms, as if in support. Worry instantly gripped almost McKay's entire being. He knew it – she'd got herself sick; working all hours godsend. Todd should have been more careful. She wasn't one of his Wraith. She needed rest.

"Besides—" Todd said, then turned his head, "Ah, Doctor McKay, I was merely discussing the merits of subduing a human settlement held in servitude by the one you call Michael."

"The one we call—" McKay spluttered in irritation, certain that this was not at all what the Wraith had been discussing with Jennifer, "Why not just call him Michael and have done with it?"

Todd ignored his snippy remark, and that irritated McKay even more as the Wraith continued, "He led me to believe that what we would find here would be immediately remarkable – important even beyond that which we might believe."

"Wait a minute." McKay's irritation was immediately replaced with alarm. "He led you to believe? You spoke with him – he told you how to get here?"

Todd swayed his head from side to side, and in a voice that conveyed his complete disinterest in the subject of how he had acquired the information that led them to this location, he said, "During one of our last encounters I managed to persuade him of the… urgency of the revelation, yes."

McKay's eyebrows shot up and he exchanged a glance with Keller, who shook her head, her face creasing in concern. In the next moment Todd continued speaking, his voice, McKay noticed, was rumbling just on the right side of patience.

"Irrelevant to you, perhaps," McKay said, his voice rising with his own righteous anger at knowing that the knowledge of Michael's location, which Teyla so desperately sought, was known to this Wraith all along; at least some clue to finding the former Wraith. "But there are people who would very much—"

"Irrelevant!" Todd roared suddenly, releasing Jennifer's arms to round on McKay, causing him to yelp audibly and Jennifer to take a hurried step forward, a trembling hand reaching for Todd's arm. "What matters is that we are here and that we retrieve such data as is necessary to assist in our goals."

"Whatever you say," McKay said hurriedly, the expression on Todd's face scaring him more than a little. He glanced at Keller just as her fingertips brushed against the Wraith's leather clad arm. "Jennifer?"

Keller shook her head, withdrawing her hand as she said, "Let's just… do what we need to do here. People are counting on us, whether they know it or not – including Colonel Sheppard."

McKay looked between Todd and Keller, a frown fixed on his face, and would have reached out to draw the woman to one side if they had not been interrupted by the arrival of one of the Wraith sub-commanders at Todd's shoulder even as the tall, slowly calming Wraith agreed, purring, "Indeed," in response to Jennifer's suggestion.

McKay couldn't help but feel, uncomfortably, that there was more going on; more behind their earnest exchange, than was immediately obvious. For his friends' sakes he meant to find out what that something was.

"Sub-Commander," Todd calmed the last of his irritation and invited his underling to speak – not that it was necessary, he could already sense from his subordinate Wraith's mind what news he had come to impart, but for the sake of his Human companions, he made the concession.

"The settlement is subdued, and its people gathered in the main square awaiting your pleasure, Commander," the other Wraith said.

"Excellent," Todd purred, then, fixing a chameleon hint of a smile on his face, he gestured for the small party to advance into the waiting settlement with a wave of his arm. "Shall we, Doctors?"

He couldn't help but find McKay's petulant response irksome as the Human scientist said, "Like we have a choice?" before he began to walk off toward the buildings.

Todd kept his pace to an easy one so that Keller could walk at his side, the tight formation of drones around her easing back slightly at his presence.

"What exactly do you expect to find here," she asked him, keeping a respectful distance between the two of them.

"The prisoners we gathered from among the hybrid creatures created by," he faltered slightly, unable to easily voice the name given to the Abomination by these Humans.

He nodded to her and continued, "Each of the hybrids that I was able to examine had been infected with the Hoffan protein in spite of the Wraith DNA and associated characteristics they possessed."

"The protein and Wraith characteristics in the same body system," Keller's voice showed her surprise. "How is that possible? All our computer modelling has shown that even when both cell types are present, rather than anneal to the Human cells, the Hoffan protein will almost actively seek out and destroy the Wraith cells."

"Indeed, Jennifer," Todd purred, more than gratified that she had immediately seen one of the major points of his belief in the importance of being here. "It is my understanding that the one you call Michael found the key to that dilemma in this place, and that is why we must discover what it is these Humans know."

He walked in silence then, taking in what he could see as they entered the village. The buildings held a curious familiarity to him in the way the angles were lost from the normal Human homes, being of a more organic shape, with almost rounded joints and overall shape. It was a familiarity that pricked his spine with discomfort.

He tried to shake the feeling away as he reached the central square where the drones and sub-commanders had corralled the people of the settlement. They were standing obediently, not at all fighting, not even really showing much fear of the Wraith surrounding them, in fact, it occurred to Todd suddenly that they reminded him of one of the many settlements of Wraith worshippers… not unlike his own.

After waking, hours before Alicia, and running all of the news he had gleaned on his return to the Elder Queen's Hive the last time, he had realised that he was in error to leave Vega behind – and one that may have cost her life. That he could not countenance, but neither could he bring her to his Hive – not with Sheppard and McKay aboard. It had been no great leap in thinking to decide to leave her in the relative safety of his own community of worshippers, at least until he was able to see to her protection personally.

Much later, as he had been preparing to leave, Alicia had stood at his side, as the community gathered before him, assuring him of their fealty – regarding her as though she were the most precious of individuals in their sight; in their care.

Todd narrowed his eyes, as he regarded them, and somewhat in surprise, said, "They are his… worshippers."

"What?" McKay spluttered, "Michael? You have got to be kidding me, he… he hates Humans – he hates everyone as a matter of fact so—"

"What better place?" he answered, "Most Wraith have little cause or indeed chance to easily reach beyond the network of portals due to the necessity of our ships to regenerate—"

"During long periods in hyperspace," McKay interjected, "but Michael would be subjected to the same problems."

"Would he?" Todd drew out the words, turning to McKay with a feral grin, watching as the Human scientist began to manipulate the pieces of information in his mind, still grinning, he added, "You have experienced how long it took for us to reach this place."

Todd saw the spark of realisation enter McKay's expression even before the man said, "Michael knew it was here."

"Indeed," Todd purred, nodding to one of his sub-commanders. "Troubling, is it not?"

"I can't believe you're being so… so… so cavalier about this," McKay yelped, rounding on Todd. "This is Michael we're talking about. The one that's been systematically poisoning your feeding grounds; who wants nothing more than to see the Wraith… wiped from the face of the galaxy—"

"An ambition you share," Todd accused softly. There was no menace in the words he spoke which were meant simply to derail McKay's tirade, to which he had no desire to listen.

"No." McKay attempted to deny the accusation, but his face fell into an almost frightened expression of apology as he went on, "Well… yes. Maybe, we—"

"All we want is to save people from being fed on," Jennifer interrupted her Atlantean companion. She took a step toward Todd and he felt her move before he turned her way and tilted his head.

"It has been the balance in this galaxy for centuries, Jennifer," he said, and felt McKay stiffen behind him, presumably at the use of the doctor's first name. "A balance which your people upset when you prematurely awakened—"

"Yeah, yeah," McKay stepped into his direct line of sight, waving his hand dismissively, high irritation in both his voice and his body language, "we've heard all that before; excuses on all sides when you look at it that way. We kill Wraith because… oh well, thank you very much we don't quite enjoy being cattle. Michael poisons Wraith and Humans alike – he doesn't care – out of revenge for what he thinks we, and his own people, did to him, and you feed on any Human that moves because… hell we woke you all up early and now you're all fighting for what food there is – it's all a crock of shit, Todd!"

Todd saw Jennifer cringe, and knew she expected him to express the anger that was bubbling under the thin veneer of calm with which he had surrounded himself. In truth, in that moment, he wanted nothing more than to inflict grievous harm on the irritating pest that McKay had become, yet he would not give the man the satisfaction of proving the words he had not said.

"Yeah, right," McKay said, pacing away a little and fixing Todd with what the Wraith thought was supposed to be a pointed glare as two drones, on the command of the sub-commander, grabbed one of the villagers by the arms and dragged him closer.

Todd turned his attention from McKay to address his prisoner. The tones he used were clipped and left little room for misunderstanding.

"You and your people will do exactly as you are instructed, and will cooperate with Doctor Keller," he gestured toward where Keller was standing, staring down one of the narrow avenues between the dwellings. "Obey her instructions to the letter and none here will be harmed. Do you understand?"

The man's answer rocked him back, and he had to work very hard to control his reaction to the unexpected declaration.

He sat back in his seat closing his eyes as he considered what he already knew, and the various pieces of the puzzle that began suddenly not to fit into place.

Perhaps the scientist did not intend to return from his latest administrative visit to his own Hive and for that the Elder Hive's Second could not blame him. The growing unease aboard the ship was almost untenably stressful; explosive and could become dangerous if but one more thing occurred to upset the knife-edge balance that by his efforts the Hive Second barely held.

The warmth of her hands against the hard knots of tension in his shoulders had him hiss audibly in the painful relief she brought him, though at the same time he cursed himself for his inattentiveness that had allowed her to approach him without his notice.

"She did so because he touched her mind and woke in her those emotions that he needed her to feel in order to fulfil that which he must in order to survive," Isla said softly, and she continued to work her skilful fingers over his snarled muscles, before she added in a low voice, "It is an old Wraith… that one."

He could not fault her assessment, or her conclusion of the Human woman's motivation. It had been his impression as well, but to hear it from her, much closer, perspective, lent him the confidence to move forward along his lines of reasoning. His mind turned things over once more even as he reached for one of Isla's hands, caught her wrist and drew her hand forward until he could turn his head and nip at the tender flesh there.

He heard the sharp intake of breath, and felt the fingers of her other hand tighten on his shoulder. He released her wrist and she drew back her hand to resume the massage, as ever not presuming on their relationship.

"The scientist removed his data from the Hive systems," he told her quietly, valuing her quick mind to work tangentially to his own.

"He means to create the belief that he will not return, but he will." Isla said with a good deal of certainty; so much that he turned and fixed her with a surprised expression that she held for a short time before lowering her gaze. "Forgive me, Lord, but when a Wraith such as that one acts thusly, it is for a reason, and this action goes beyond not wishing for others to access his research. He is protecting something…"

"Lord?" Isla looked up at him, and he pushed a little at her will to prevent her from looking away. She tensed, sliding her hands away from his shoulders; pulling back until he caught her wrist again and prevented her from moving away.

"The Queen's handmaiden," he told her softly, releasing her mind, gratified to see that she now voluntarily held his gaze.

"The same," he said. "He has taken her from the Hive and, as yet, the Queen does not know about that."

"The Queen is—" His soft growl and the slight warning tilt of his head stopped her tongue if not her thoughts, which he lifted from her suddenly churning mind. "My Lord, I meant no disrespect, I merely—"

He trailed off, thinking through the myriad possible titles he could append to the beginning of that sentence: scientist, advisor, favoured, consort… antagonist…

"He is hers. That is enough." Isla said, and he could not stop the chuckle that escaped him. "I have amused you?"

"He was never hers, Isla, and he fights her still. In fact, I am beginning to find it sits… more than a little uneasily within me to believe that he was captured and brought before her as it would seem he was," he mused aloud.

He saw her frown, and could feel that she was turning this information over with that which she already knew.

Jennifer Keller turned her head away as the Wraith drones dragged one of the villagers closer to where Todd stood to gaze into the shadowed space between two dwellings. As she did she thought she saw movement, and tuning out the voices she began to inch her way toward the place, slipping between the buildings, finally out from under the stifling presence of her drone guards.

She turned away from looking back at Todd and was almost bowled over by the small shape that came barrelling toward her, growling softly, and as it got closer she saw that the shape was a small child, no more than a toddler.

"Hey, hey, hey," she crooned, crouching to the child. "Take it easy. I'm not going to hurt you."

"See? I'm gentle," she told him, as he froze, allowing her touch. "Where's your mommy, hmm? Are you lost?"

He raised his head to look at her then, and she almost recoiled and snatched away her hand in surprise, falling onto her backside as a woman came out of nowhere and picked up the boy, cradling him against her chest.

"It's all right," Jennifer said, a sudden urgency in her mind as she tried to make sense of what she had seen. "I won't—"

"He's my son, and I won't let you take him," the woman said, already backing away still further.

The woman turned and fled, ducking into the deeper shadows from which both she and the boy had come.

"Doctor Keller," Todd growled behind her, and she started trying to get to her feet. His hand closed around her arm, and he drew her to her feet, not letting go once she was upright.

"You are a better scientist than you are a liar, Jennifer," he told her, tightening his fingers until the grasp was almost painful. "What did you see?"

"You're hurting me," she protested, refusing to answer his question and betray the woman and her child.

"You know as well as I do," he rumbled dangerously, "this is nothing. Answer my question."

"Bastard! Don't you—" she started struggling, trying to pull her arm out of his grip, her sudden anger lending her strength. It wasn't enough. His grasp was unyielding, but she was more than angry at his presumption on her obedience to him and refused to let him simply threaten her into submission. Without thinking she raised her knee, fast and hard, aiming for his groin.

Todd snarled, apparently anticipating the attack, and turned just enough that her knee connected with his thigh. In the next instant, however, Jennifer felt herself lifted as his free hand closed around her throat, and she was slammed against the wall of the building behind her, all of the air rushing out of her lungs, as she was pinned there as Todd stepped up close.

"You would be wise," he said against her cheek, and the words rumbled against her chest as he pressed closer still, "never to try such a thing again."

As he finished speaking he shifted his grasp on her slightly so that he could lean down to nip at the side of her neck. It was not the soft nip of warning she had received from time to time, but the arrogant, possessive bite that he had so often given to her in the heat of the rut. She knew it held the promise of demonstration as to why this should be the case and her stomach turned a full, nauseating somersault even as the hairs on her body rose and sent an enlivened shiver through her slight form.

"Hey!" the shout came as if from a long way off, but at its insistent repetition, she felt Todd lower her to the ground, withdraw the touch of his hands from her arm and her neck, and take a half step back.

Her knees wobbled shamefully under her, and she pressed both hands against the wall to give herself greater support as McKay finally pushed his way past the drones at the entrance to the inter-building space.

"While we continue to search for the other's facility, we must prepare an area where we can begin an examination of these people, and analyse our findings against our current data," Todd said to her. His voice was clipped and business like – as though nothing untoward had just happened. Keller felt a flush of shame. As McKay came closer she removed one hand from the wall to press it against a trickle of blood she felt against her neck. In answer to Todd, she nodded wordlessly and pushed herself the rest of the way upright, meaning to follow Todd as he strode away.

"What's going on, Jen?" he asked softly, frowning in concern. His face was pale.

"Nothing," she said, easing her arm out of his grasp. "Just a disagreement, that's all."

She started to move again, feeling McKay following quickly behind her as he caught her arm again.

"That's not what it looked like to me," he told her urgently, his voice confidential.

Shame rushed back in to suffocate her and she bit the inside of her cheek, hard, to stop the blush she could feel beginning to follow in its wake. Angrily she snatched her arm away again.

Every avenue of enquiry he could think of exhausted, Ronon walked disconsolately back through the Gate, and immediately into Atlantis' hallways. He felt as though he'd somehow failed Teyla with his inability to find her and that feeling did not sit well with him.

Before he knew where he was going, his feet were carrying him along the corridors that led to the brig.

"Sorry, Ronon," the S.O. at the door stepped into his way. "Sheppard's orders, no one goes—"

"Get out. Of my way," Ronon snarled, pushing the man to the side and palming open the door. He locked it by virtue of taking out the middle crystal from the locking mechanism.

He turned to face the cell within, only to find Lorne watching him, his head tilted to one side. His expression made him look bored, sardonic even.

"What you believe or don't believe doesn't really matter. It's the truth, and neither of us can change that, no matter how we might want to." Lorne answered.

"Damn it, Lorne!" Ronon slapped his hand against the bars in frustration, heedless of the force field erected as an additional protection against the hybrid's escape. "She was your friend once. There has to be something you can tell me. Where is Michael?"

"I can't tell you," Lorne slapped his own hand against the bars, the force field crackled around his hand, sending bursts of energy discharging against his palm, filling the air with the sickly scent of ozone.

"Listen to me, you sorry son-of-a-bitch," he snarled, palming off the force field and all but wrenching open the door as the automatic slider moved too slowly for his tattered patience to stand. Lorne took a step back as Ronon advanced on him, but Ronon was too fast and grabbed him by the medical scrubs that he'd been given to wear and shook him as he continued, "if anything happens to Teyla and I find out you were lying to me, hybrid or not, I'll—"

"You'll what?" Lorne spat, squaring up to the man. "Act as the bully you've always been? Unyielding, prejudiced, unable to see the possibilities for the changes your people forced on him – on us. You never even gave him a chance to prove he could have been different. You and all the people here like you brought this to be. You drove. Him. To this. She alone—"

Growling, Ronon drew back his free hand, balled fist ready to spread the hybrid-Lorne's nose all over his face. He didn't even hear the door behind him slide open.

"Ronon, stand down!" Woolsey's voice, urgent but softly spoken, cut through the haze of rage that had descended over him enough to make him realise what he was about to do. Instead he let go of Lorne, and without even a breath, turned on his heel and pushing Woolsey and the marines aside stormed into the corridors, before breaking into an angry run.

He didn't know where he was going, he just knew he had to run, to escape the feeling of failure that was all that he knew in that moment.

Rodney McKay was not known for delicacy. He was usually direct, forthcoming – more often than not putting his foot into his mouth, right up to the knee, so instead of voicing what was on his mind, he kept silent, sitting at the side of the room that Todd had commandeered for Jennifer to do her work, and take her samples from the locals.

Still, as he sat, his mind churned over all the facts. He could tell that something was bothering Jennifer – terribly so – and he couldn't help but think that it had something to do with the altercation he had witnessed that afternoon. The argument, the atmosphere, it was all too chillingly familiar.

He tried to dismiss it, put it down to how stressed and tired they all were, and he could see very clearly that Jennifer was more than a little tired, but something kept the warning bells ringing in his head.

"There's a lot to do, Rodney," Jennifer answered, tucking a strand of hair behind her ear, and yawning into the back of her other hand. "We have to take these results back to the Hive, one of these people might hold the key to… well, to—"

"To getting you away from Todd so that he can't play games with you any more?" Rodney had said the words almost before he realised he had spoken.

Jennifer spun, turning on him as he began to cross the room and demanded, "What the hell is that supposed to mean?"

He refused to back down. He could tell she was covering for something, and that whatever it was, it was making her miserable, and he didn't like to see any of his friends like that.

"Oh, come on, Jennifer!" he said, reaching out toward her, "I'm not blind and I'm certainly not stupid. Ever since we've been on Todd's Hive there's been something wrong – something you're not telling Sheppard and me, and now with this thing in the alley back there, I think I understand what. Jen, if Todd's making improper advances o—"

His stomach churned at the thought of it; the thought of a Wraith – any Wraith – but especially Todd, putting his hands on Jennifer… He knew that for a Wraith that kind of thing was not… not the norm… well at least he thought he did.

Though, maybe there was doubt even then, and since his return from the alternate universe, where it had seemed that the Todd they'd found there had somehow been involved with Captain Vega… or maybe she'd been involved with him… in either case, the thought of the same thing happening here with Jennifer made him feel physically sick.

"Oh I could see that," McKay snapped back, running on, "I wonder what it was that gave me the clue – oh wait! Could it have been the fact that he had you pinned up against the wall by the throat?"

"I said, leave it, McKay. You don't understand!" Jennifer snapped back and started to turn back to her work.

McKay caught her arm, turned her back and said, "So help me to understand, because from what I saw, yes, you pissed him off, but then – I know this is going to sound ridiculous – but it looked a hell of a lot like he kissed you."

"Don't be so absurd!" Jennifer spat, a little breathless, and as she freed her arm from his grasp, she raised her hand to press it against the high collar of the lab coat she wore. "If you must know, he was angry that I hadn't done as I was told and stayed with the drones. He was trying to intimidate me; whispering threats."

McKay relaxed slightly, but only a little, in his mind replaying what he had seen. He could accept that perhaps that could have been what had happened, that Todd's cheek pressed to hers could have brought his lips close to her ear, to whisper… intimidate… threaten.

"He's not going to let me go, Rodney," Jennifer said, a tremor in her voice. "If I don't start to give him the results he needs, he's going to keep me on that Hive and—"

"He told you that?" McKay asked, frowning. "You know that's never going to happen, Jen – if nothing else, Sheppard won't let him keep you."

"He won't have a choice," Jennifer said. She shook her head. "Unless we find what he's looking for; the answers he needs, he's never going to let me go."

McKay blinked, then felt the shock running through him, almost worse than the thought that there might have been something… unsavoury going on between Todd and Jennifer… the thought that they had willingly allowed her to put herself in that position.

"Jennifer, I'm… I'm sorry. We should never have let you do this," he said, his voice full of the absolute horror that gripped him. "It was stupid. I'll talk to Sheppard; tell him—"

"No!" The vehemence with which she spoke made McKay jump, and he didn't like the speed with which she'd answered either.

"If you say anything to Sheppard he's just going to get himself into trouble, McKay, you know that." She shook her head again, "We're on Todd's Hive, we have to go by Todd's rules. You just gotta let me… do what I have to do."

He saw her shiver, and she wrapped her arms around herself. As she did, her lab coat shifted and he caught sight of the bruise on her neck. It didn't seem to be any better. In fact, it seemed to be more livid than ever.

Todd backhanded the man, not hard – he didn't want to snap his neck after all – but hard enough to demonstrate his sincerity.

"I have answered it," the man insisted as he straightened up. "Your coming was foretold… and some among us felt your arrival."

"Impossible!" Todd roared, mentally ordering the drones away, and grasping the front of the man's shirt to pull him closer. He knew of only one person who could sense the arrival of the Wraith and she was not among them. Lowering his voice to a rumbling growl he leaned closer to the prisoner and said, "Just because I do not believe it wise to feed on you does not mean there are not other ways of soliciting my demands."

"Then ask them, Commander," the man answered, and though Todd could smell his fear – taste it – he did not back down.

"I have already asked," Todd snarled, his patience ragged. "How did you come to know we would come here?"

"We were told there would be a time when you would come. You, and not another. Your description was given to us," the man said.

"The one that came before," the man answered. "Our people sensed his arrival barely minutes before—"

"I told you, that's impossible," Todd started, meaning to say more, but he was cut off by the soft voice that came from behind him.

"Not impossible," Keller said, coming up to him with her computer tablet in her hand. He let go of the man, letting him drop to the ground and turned to snatch the tablet from the doctor's hands. "They're hybrids, Todd – each and every one of them."

Todd looked up from his reading, a disbelieving scowl on his face. At his silent command two drones came to remove the man from their presence, glaring at Jennifer the whole time, pinning her to the spot like a specimen butterfly.

"You're wrong," he snarled when they were alone. He tossed the computer aside and advanced on her. "Your results are wrong. There must have been some error in your analysis."

"How dare you!" Jennifer snapped, straightening her back in spite of his advance and standing her ground. "I have never given you reason to doubt my science. I have always given you complete and accurate results."

He reached for her as he got close enough, and this time she did take a step away.

"Don't you touch me, you bastard!" she hissed at him. "My results are right. My findings are accurate and no amount of threatening me or pushing me around… or anything is going to change that."

"They do not have the appearance of—" he growled, almost hesitating in his advance, just for a moment. It was long enough for her to shock him completely.

"Natural hybrids," she said, "and only one or two of them like Teyla, and Kanaan. Are they the product of some kind of… genetic splice in years gone by? I don't know. All I know is that it's hereditary. They have both Human and Wraith DNA, and—"

"And what, Doctor Keller," he demanded, his voice pitched low, soft in the menace he projected. "One more step and the wall is behind you. What will you do then?"

She froze and as she did his reaching hand closed around her arm, drawing her to him. His mind wrapped around hers, sparing nothing for the fact that she was unused to that level of invasive control and he forced her to look up at him.

"Todd, don't…" she said, her voice just on the edge of a whimper. "You've no reason to be angry with me for bringing you the truth."

He was not so out of control that he did not reach for the buried memory, known to all commanders of his antiquity, but more especially to him…

As he came back to the present he realised that he had mantled. The startled, terrified look in Keller's eyes speared him, and halted the forward motion of his hand, even as she cried out.

"There's a boy! A Wraith, even though one of the women claims him as her son!" she cried. "Please, let go of me."

Keller shook her head. "I saw them in the alley between the buildings. It's why I was there. I haven't seen them since."

Todd sent the instant summons to the drones, plundering the images from Keller's mind before releasing her from his mental grip. She sagged, falling against him and for a moment he held her – supportive, perhaps even feeling a momentary pang of remorse.

In the wake of it, as she fought to catch her breath he said almost softly, "You must stop fighting me, Jennifer."

He chuckled softly, setting her upright once more, but did not let go before she nodded briefly.

"You are certain of these results?" he asked as he retrieved the tablet and brought it back to her.

"Yes," she said. "Every single one of them, hybrids, and all of them carry the Hoffan protein."

He did not have the chance to give her the answer that was on his tongue. From outside, in the centre of the settlement, the sound of an explosion barely reached them before the closed shutters burst inward, raining debris into the room even as he snatched Keller from her place, and sheltered her beneath him as he threw the both of them to the floor.

Landing on the floor beneath the Wraith's protective bulk winded her, and she gasped softly as she tried to take her next breath. Todd's form, shielding her from the dust and pieces of wood and other debris was almost suffocating, but even so she was thankful, and he held her, still pressed beneath his body against the floor of the house.

"But—" she started to argue with him and he rounded on her in a half crouch, his face wild, almost animalistic and fixed in a snarl. His hair flew out behind him.

He left her no reason to doubt that his anger, if she were to disobey him this time, would not so quickly be mollified.

She nodded, and then all but screamed as he upended the table and pushed it until it sat between her and the doorway. Understanding she scrambled to put her back against its protective surface. He nodded once, and then hurried away, and she heard the door open and close behind him. As it opened, the louder sounds of the conflict outside reached her ears.

They came out of nowhere and McKay particularly hated that. There were about fifteen or twenty of them from what he managed to count as he ducked behind the well in the middle of the village, Michael's hybrids, probably come in defence of what was theirs.

"Crap!" he hissed, realising that Jennifer was inside the building with Todd and knew nothing of the attack. It was the only thought he had time for before the explosion ripped through the settlement, sending pieces of incendiary devices, and debris from the annihilated buildings flying in all directions, and causing similar damage to those nearby.

He ducked still further behind what was left of the well, covering his head with his arms. He was helpless, unarmed… there was nothing he could do except cower there like some terrified school girl. He hated himself for it.

The sounds of Wraith blasters exchanging fire filled the air as drones ran quickly to new positions to find their targets, some of them torn and bleeding as they passed him by.

"So not good!" he murmured to himself, and tried to crane his neck to see the building into which Jennifer had gone in search of Todd. The door opened, but as McKay tried to peer inside, trying to check on his friend, his view was obscured by the emerging Wraith and he could see nothing but the upturned furniture within.

Todd's face was fixed with an expression of fury, his yellow eyes burning across the distance, as though he was searching for the perpetrator of some heinous crime. As the Wraith moved, drew his stunner and started across the clearing toward the battle, dust and smoke whirled in convection currents around the bottom of his leather battle coat, as though moved by the heat of Todd's fury.

McKay swallowed, and tried again to see past the Wraith, but even as Todd moved out of the doorway, three drones moved to take up defensive positions, guarding the door that one of them closed from the inside after he entered. McKay knew that he should have been comforted by the fact that Todd seemed to be making sure that Jennifer was safe, but it sat uncomfortably with him.

As if the Wraith could hear his thoughts, Todd turned his head in McKay's direction, and his voice rang out across the clearing, giving instructions to marshal the chaos of the battle, addressing his sub-commanders in a tone that brooked no argument.

"Hold them here while we circle to their flank, and have a care for your targets, I want at least one of them alive!" he roared, giving voice to his anger and McKay shuddered to think what he might do with one of the hybrid soldiers if any were captured.

He jumped, and let out a sound that even he would have described as a 'girly scream' as a sudden dead weight fell beside him, disturbing more clouds of dust. Covering his mouth and nose against it with the sleeve of his jacket, McKay looked over at the fallen Wraith sub-commander.

"Yes!" he exclaimed, leaning across the fallen figure to snatch the blaster from its hand. Now he could help. Now he could do some real damage.

His momentary elation was stolen when Todd's voice rang out again, issuing a second command. "And find the Human – I need him alive as well!"

The Lower Station was stifling, its airless tension making everything seem sharp and even more dangerous than usual and there was no respite from it. The Hive Commander recognised this, feeling and tasting the simmering fear of the worshippers housed in this contemptuous place.

She was not there. He knew before he even reached the central chamber in order to interrogate the Handlers that the Queen's second handmaiden was not among the worshippers. She was not in her quarters either, or the scientist's laboratory, pandering to that one's whims and enjoying his protection, even though he doubted she had ever done that arrogant Wraith any service that afforded her the title and position of concubine.

He could come to only one conclusion. The scientist had somehow spirited her away from the Hive.

He halted in his tracks. No sense in lingering here, and asking questions to which he already knew the answers. He had better things to do with his time… others with which he meant to deal… when the time came. Until then, there were plans he had yet to make.

Even though they were outflanked, Michael's hybrids had fallen back, accepting the casualties that such a desperate tactic had wrought in order to protect what must be the entrance to the facility for which McKay and the others had been searching.

He knew it was only a matter of time, and that they stood little chance against the fury of the Wraith that was fighting from the other side of the approach. How could so few hybrids stand against the might of a Hive ship full of Wraith?

Even as the thought crossed his mind he began to hear the distant whine of Wraith Darts, coming closer.

He was drawn, somewhat suddenly from his dark contemplations by the stinging shower of brick fragments that flew to cut his cheek. Repeated fire from the hybrid that had him pinned behind the wall chipped further at the hardened clay shield, taking it down piece by piece. He shielded his head with his hands for a long moment, before the wick of his anger, ignited, finally got the better of him.

He suddenly threw himself sideways, rolling into the open and resting both hands along the dirt, fired over and over again into the hybrid line. Overhead the Darts came swooping in, as heedless of McKay and his pin prick assault on the enemy as they were of the hybrid defences themselves. It was over in seconds.

The barrage of fire from the Darts' strafing runs barely missed him, blowing huge gouges in the ground to either side of him. McKay covered his head again, barely holding back the curses that were poised to come streaming out of his mouth into the sudden acute silence.

It took him a while to realise that no fiery death had rained down on him from the heavens and, incredulous, he let out a single peel of almost hysterical laughter, rolling onto his back, clutching the Wraith stunner to his chest.

"The weapon, Doctor McKay," Todd's voice rolled over the otherwise silent arena, where, already, Wraith drones were beginning to separate the living from the dead. He held out his hand, waiting for McKay to hand over the blaster.

"And the horse you rode in on…" he said, and wondering himself whether he were either brave or foolish, he raised the stunner from the position in which he held it, lying on his chest, and pointed it directly at the Wraith, "…pal!"

Todd growled softly, fixing McKay with a withering expression, not of anger, but of contempt.

"If I thought you were at all serious," he purred, completely unruffled, "I might threaten to feed on you for your insolence."

Pushed one step beyond his limit, McKay felt his cheeks flush with anger, and though his throat constricted involuntarily as his brain told him how stupid his actions were, he brought his other hand to try and steady the shake as he aimed at the Wraith.

"Well then you better find yourself a nice Chianti, because I am – deadly serious," he squeaked. "I want to know what's going on, Todd, between you and Jen…nifer."

He decided against shortening her name, but was no less angry, when the look of wild fury entered Todd's eyes, and in a voice that was more than just a little south of absolute zero, the Wraith said, "This is hardly the time or the place to discuss that, Doctor. We have work to do."

What happened next wasn't intentional, and even as it was happening, McKay wanted to drop the weapon, cower away and scream his innocence to the sky. I didn't mean to do it… it was an accident. As his bravado began to fade in the face of Todd's anger, the tremor in his hand increased, and clasped as it was, tightly around the hilt of the weapon, his finger hit, and squeezed the trigger.

His aim was off, though by some miracle, not by much, and the shot grazed the top of Todd's shoulder, cutting a searing line through the leather and flesh beneath. Todd hissed loudly with the pain of it, and crouching over McKay in an instant, he first slapped the weapon aside, and out of McKay's grasp with one hand, and then mantled his feeding hand before thrusting it forward with a speed to match his fury.

Jennifer's voice rang out, an urgent appeal across the distance between where she stood with the drones, and where Todd loomed over her companion, his feeding hand barely a whisper away from McKay's chest.

"Please," she added, a more direct appeal, walking away from the drones and approaching the terrifying image of Pegasus Still Life. As she got closer she could see the still-smoking wound on the top of Todd's shoulder, and realised that his uncharacteristic savagery was at least in part due to the pain he must be in. "He's sorry, right Rodney?"

"Uh… yeah," McKay stammered, realising only as the words were tumbling out of his mouth what a cliché it was as he said, "It just… went off in my hand."

"Hmmm," Todd growled softly as the blinding heat faded from his awareness. Slowly he reached out the rest of the way toward the Human at his mercy, perversely enjoying the way McKay cringed, and turned his feeding hand to take a fistful of the jacket McKay wore into his grasp and haul the man to his feet.

Behind the carefully controlled movement, he fought a battle with himself. Such a loss of control was unacceptable, and he knew that soon – very soon – he would have to return to the Hive and deal with one of the factors that were causing his shortening temper. The young queen's Zenith could not be allowed to continue unfulfilled and much as he was loathe to bring her relief until he was ready; as much as he permitted himself the fleeting reprieve from madness that Keller afforded him, it was not enough. She was not enough, and neither would be this queen.

"There is work that we must do," he growled softly, releasing McKay from his grasp and pointedly smoothing out the wrinkles in the other man's jacket as he did so, before he turned and walked toward the entrance to Michael's facility.

McKay breathed out a long, heartfelt sigh of relief as Todd turned away, and cradled his right hand in his left. He glanced over at Jennifer as she came to his side, her face a picture of concern.

"I, er… said some things that maybe I shouldn't have," McKay confessed, "before I accidentally shot him. God, I think he broke my finger."

Keller reached over and took him by the wrist, pulling his hand closer in order to examine his fingers. He winced, and let out an audible cry as she manipulated the digits carefully.

Tears welled in Keller's eyes as she examined McKay's hand, and not from any concern for her patient. There would be hell to pay for all of this, and she would be the one to pay it. In that moment she didn't know how much more she could take. She tried to gather the tatters of her resolve around herself to shore up her strength of mind. She let go of McKay's wrist. His middle finger was, in fact, broken.

"There's nothing I can do here," she told him. Then she nodded toward the entrance through which Todd had, by then, disappeared. With a sigh she added, "Perhaps inside."

"I don't want to hear it, McKay," she said. "Do you want to find a cure for Sheppard; for the Hoffan syndrome? Or maybe you have some kind of… perverse death wish. Me? I'm tired of covering for your fuck-ups, Rodney. I can't do it any more. Either stop… antagonising Todd or you're on your own!"

Before he had a chance to answer she turned on her heel and quickly followed Todd through into Michael's facility, more angry with herself for allowing herself to show how worked up she was than she was with McKay. He was only looking out for her, she knew… or rather he was trying to, but what the hell would he do if he ever found out the truth?

She didn't slow her steps when he called after her, sounding hurt and confused. More than anything she didn't want him to see the tears that fell from her eyes.

Todd turned full circle in the centre of the huge, dimly lit laboratory. He tilted his head as he looked on the figures suspended in the greenish fluid caught, breathless, somewhere between admiration and wonder, and prickling with horror at what he saw.

The Wraith, held in the life sustaining fluid was withered and pale. His eyes shot through with the red madness of the need to feed, and signs of some excruciating pain that visibly twisted his limbs even in the relative stasis of the chamber. From the lower abdomen of the unfortunate sub-commander tubules emerged, connecting this Wraith with the occupants of the other chambers; Human men and women who in turn were linked by similar tubules to the system that made up the majority of the rest of the laboratory – a series of pods, not unlike the hibernation system aboard a Hive.

The fluid in one of the tanks bubbled suddenly as the occupant, a Human woman, suddenly thrashed in her semi-consciousness, and a slow spiral of a darker fluid began to seep into the luminous green of the chamber's sustaining fluid where the tubules began, almost as if they were aware of her impending demise, to detach themselves.

Keller's shocked voice came from behind him. He partly turned his head to watch her as she hurried toward him, her intention clear. She meant to pass him and go to the console in front of the chambers. She was going to try and help these people.

Before she could move past him, he grasped her arm, relentlessly holding her from her purpose.

As he turned his head he saw too that McKay, who stood to her other side, had also taken her by the arm. He was the first to speak.

"Let me go," she snarled at the both of them, and then to McKay added, "I can damn well try! We have to get them out of there."

"There's no way to reach them," McKay argued with her. "There's no telling if Michael rigged this place the way he did the others, but based on his track record, I'd say it was a pretty safe bet."

"No," she drew out the word, but Todd could feel that she had begun to capitulate to the other man's logic. Her helplessness caused her emotional distress. "Rodney…"

"They are beyond your—" Todd began to add, and when she turned a glare his way he amended, "beyond our help and were from the moment the one you call Michael began his experimentation upon them."

"Todd's right," McKay said, quiet and sorrowful in the way he spoke and Keller's struggles with the both of them slowed and then ceased all together.

"Doctor McKay, we need access to the computer system here," Todd said, taking a breath and letting it out as a sigh as his mind raced with myriad assumptions and suppositions. To Keller he said, almost softly, though not really feeling the compassion his words suggested, "The kindest thing we can do for them now is to give them a swift… end to their suffering."

"Do it, Rodney," Keller said hotly, and snatched her arm out of Todd's grasp. He watched as she stormed as far away from both of them as she could. Felt as she tried to catch a hold of her churning emotions, without much success.

For a moment he was at a loss as to what he could say, and started to wonder why he needed to say anything. The Human woman obviously wanted to be alone with her thoughts, so why should he try to draw her mind back to the task in hand?

"Doctor Keller…" The words he spoke next answered his internal questioning. "Will you be able to perform the tasks necessary in order to complete our work here?"

She spun around on him, and for a moment he expected some kind of tirade to issue forth from her lips, full of the colourful Human expletives with which she often regaled him. He tilted his head, regarding her fully, and saw the tension in her body as she assured him softly, "I'll be fine. Just promise me we're going to let them go."

He moved closer to her then, pitching his voice low so that only she would hear.

"You have my word, Jennifer, once we have the necessary samples, I will endeavour to find a way to shut down the machines that are keeping these unfortunate people alive."

She straightened then, raising her hand to place it on his arm. "Good enough," she told him. "Now let me take a look at that shoulder."

"Which of us here is the doctor?" Keller asked, and he could not help but chuckle, and then, humouring her, he moved to sit down on the edge of one of the consoles so that she could more easily reach his shoulder. Yes, it was still sore, but he had not been lying when he said it was already healing. He could feel the edges of his flesh beginning to knit.

Keller's hands against his shoulder were cooling though, soothing the fire that lingered there – though not another that he barely held beneath the surface. He took a breath and said, "So, Doctor, what is your prognosis?"

"You're… doing okay," she said, and he watched as she tucked a strand of her hair behind her ear. "Healing nicely."

"Hmm," he answered, and would have said more, but for McKay's sudden and alarmed call.

"Um… guys!" he said urgently, "Whatever you gotta do I suggest you do it fast, we already tripped the failsafe just by coming in here. I managed to put in a temporary bypass – input a sub-routine into the computer's main processor, but it won't keep it busy for long and then it will start triggering the detonators."

"How long?" Todd cursed The Abomination inwardly. He might have known that a place like this would be protected differently than the others. Even as he asked he began to move toward McKay and the chambers were Michael's test subjects floated, oblivious.

"I don't know," McKay exclaimed, "ten minutes, twenty? How am I supposed to know. It depends on the speed of the processor, the read-write time the—"

"Do you think you can over-ride the lockout codes in that time?" Todd asked, his eyes running over the information tumbling over the screen of the console at which McKay stood.

Todd shook his head, and corrected the man urgently, "The lockouts on the file directory."

"Do what you can," Todd growled, tossing him a rolled, soft leather case full of data storage chips. "Just download the files. We can worry about decrypting them back on the Hive."

"I'm on it!" McKay said, and turned to the console again. Todd watched as the near panic of a moment before dissolved under the influence of the challenge of breaking The Abomination's system.

"Jennifer," he called to her softly. "Help me take the physical samples from these individuals. Perhaps the answers we seek will be a part of them, and not any of the written records."

"How?" Jennifer asked as she came to stand at the side of Todd in front of the chambers.

Todd gestured to the tendrils and tubules entering and exiting the individuals and the parts of them that emerged through valves in the side of each of the chambers.

"I would imagine these carry fluids from the one to another. It's likely that The A— that…" he hesitated to use the human name they had given to the other, "…Michael used these to extract test samples himself."

Jennifer nodded, a slight frown on her face as she said, "All right. The medical case should still have some empty vials and needles."

McKay had never input codes, and run algorithms so fast in his life. He had no way of knowing how long his sub-routine would keep Michael's computer occupied – if only it could have been as simple as ordering it to calculate the exact value of pi – or how much longer the failsafe countdown had to run before he had noticed it. All he did know was that the moment it started up again; when it started triggering those detonators, he, Jennifer, Todd and everything left in the laboratory, probably the entire facility, was toast.

Behind him, Todd and Jennifer worked just as quickly to extract biological samples and secure them in the medical case for transportation back to the Hive. Each of the three of them was working as part of a frighteningly well oiled machine – considering.

Finally gaining access, and triumphantly pushing one of the Wraith data chips home into the housing he murmured to himself, "Always did work better under pressure."

One after another of the data chips he pressed into place, filling them with all the files he could find, not even bothering to try and decipher the Wraith script on any of the file names, falling into a routine to get as much of the data stored as he could in the time that he had.

The end was heralded by the sudden power failure to most of the lab, and by the collapse of the data stream into a single pulsing point in the centre of the screen.

"We're out of time!" he yelled, snatching the last chip he'd been using from the system and hurriedly packing it into the leather roll Todd had given him. "We gotta go!"

Turning he saw Todd none too gently push Jennifer in the direction of the door. Then the Wraith bent to snap the medical case closed before following quickly behind her.

"Go," the Wraith ordered, and out of the corner of his eye, McKay saw the blinking point in the centre of the screen morphed and began to read off numbers, counting backwards, just as before, when all this madness began.

"There's no way we're going to make it!" he cried, hurrying after the retreating Wraith none the less. His heart was pounding, the fear mounting, but the anger too grew to match it. He'd come too far to fall foul of something like this. "It's too far to get out of the compound."

Todd growled softly, and reached out with his free hand to grab the Human by the arm. He would drag the man along if he had to. As they hurried down the corridor, to his superior Wraith hearing, the rhythmic beeps of the countdown were a comfort – giving them time to exit the building… and that was all that was necessary.

As they rounded the corner, the exit door in sight, he detected a new sound, a slight click, followed by a whine that rose in pitch.

Looking up ahead, he saw that Keller had already reached the door, was pushing it open; almost outside. He redoubled his efforts to reach her, dragging McKay in tow, hearing that the detonator had reached the peak of its charge. He hit Keller and the opening door hard just as the sickening sound of ignition almost deafened him.

The air around him became hot and he knew in seconds it would be superheated as the explosion ate up the oxygen around the fire it created, ravenous for more to feed itself. They had less than seconds, and since the explosion had momentarily rendered his hearing useless, he had no other option than to seek with his mind.

The chilling fizz of the culling beam swept over him, and as the superheated fire rolled over the space that he and the others had occupied, shrivelling the weeds that had grown up between the cracks in the melting tarmac, making of the place the heart of the inferno, the Dart powered away, assisted by the convection of heat, toward the Hive waiting in its orbit over the planet.

The tremulous voice came from the shadows just beyond the junction that marked the boundary between the Lower Station and the rest of the Hive. He slowed to a halt, and turned to face the single figure that revealed itself from that space. He swallowed his surprise when he recognised the face of the Human woman, Queen's handmaiden that he had taken as his concubine.

She lowered her gaze before him, and stood slightly bowed, almost whispering, "Forgive my presumption, Lord Commander, but the one you seek is not here."

He growled softly. The anger he already felt in the seemingly permanent hunger that had lodged inside of him flaring at the thought that this woman, this lowly creature on which he would be better off feeding than anything else that had occurred between them, had been following him. Still, as companion to the One that he indeed was searching for, she may be able to give him the information he sought.

"Speak," he commanded and stepped toward her, grasping her chin in uncaring fingers to force her gaze up to meet his.

"She is not aboard the Hive at all, Lord," she said quietly. "I heard she and the other speaking, when they did not know I was near. He has taken her elsewhere, to safety, he said."

The Hive Commander snarled and all but threw the woman back against the wall of the Hive as he roared, "Tell me what you heard!"

Winded and afraid, Hanna fought to keep her feet under her. She had meant for this to be redemption in his eyes, not to bring her further danger in a Hive already rank with it.

"I… she…" she began, then managing to take a breath at last, said, "I had come to inform her that our Queen would need us to attend her when she met again with our allies. She was with him in his laboratory facilities. He had sent for her the previous days…"

Hanna closed her eyes as she finished her tale, hoping that the Hive Commander would find the information useful and that she would once again be elevated to his favour.

"You have served me well," the Commander said, his voice low, a hint of danger rumbling through it, but Hanna's heart soared none the less.

It was typical that both of the consoles at which he worked signalled the end of their simulation at the same time.

He glanced over at Keller, and finding her still engrossed in the analysis of the progression by which The Abomination had been creating the hybrids he made at that facility, he moved first to the machine that had been working on the simulation of the recombinant Wraith-Human DNA when exposed to the Hoffan protein.

His brow ridges furrowed deeply as he ran his eyes over the tumbling character representations of amino acids and poly-peptide bonds. There was a key hidden somewhere in the data and he would find it. He had to find it for his people to survive.

Moving away, he began to prepare the equipment he would need in order to synthesise the formula that his mental calculations, based on the simulation results, suggested would provide a solution and halt, perhaps even prevent the systematic shutdown of all Wraith internal organs should one happen to be careless enough to feed on an infected Human.

"Did you find something?" Keller's voice came from closer than her previous position had been, and, as casually as he could, he reached over to darken the monitor on the second of the two consoles, the one on which he had been comparing the DNA structures of the people they had found, the child that had displayed more Wraith characteristics than those of his hybrid mother, Wraith, and the blood samples taken from both Doctor Keller, and Alicia.

The thought kindled in him an almost painful longing, a need to move the Hive from its current position, still in orbit, in case there was further information they required for their research, and bring them to a new position above the Ecruo homeworld, where she waited for his promised return.

He felt the rising of his body temperature, his blood beginning to speed through his system, and knew then that it was not the thought alone that had kindled the autonomic response. His condition had been gathering pace since the moment he stepped foot aboard the Hive. His young queen's pheromones called to the instinctive creature his reason trapped within.

"I believe so," he managed to pull his mind to the present enough to answer Keller, growling softly when she drew too near to him, and her own scent washed over him. He stepped aside so that she could see the equipment he had gathered and draw conclusions from the ingredients he had chosen with which to make the serum, watching as she first glanced toward the still active monitor, where his simulation was looping through the probable effects of the medicine.

"My God, you—" Keller started, looking at him incredulously. "That treatment, even in a healthy individual is a big risk, Todd. Someone already suffering the effects of the Hoffan syndrome – or worse, a dying Wraith, I mean… you know how quickly the protein attacks the Wraith physiognomy. You can't possibly—"

"It is for those very reasons that this is the only viable course of action," Todd rumbled, knowing the risks. He did not need to have it pointed out to him. "Anything else would require too long to be of any conceivable use."

She reached out to grasp his wrist, preventing him from beginning the synthesis of the serum. He snatched his hand away as though her touch burned him. It may as well have done. His being alone in the laboratory with the Human woman, having dismissed McKay as soon as they had finished decrypting the files, was dangerous, and not only for Keller. If he were to lose control now – show weakness within the semi-sentient awareness of a Hive already unbalanced in coming to know a foreign queen as its own – it could very well cost him his life.

"What's wrong?" Keller asked, further irritating him with her perceptive compassion. She reached out for him again, giving him a look of concern.

"Do not!" he snarled, stepping away, putting distance between them. He knew in that moment that the time in which he could continue to subjugate the young queen to his will was at an end. With as even a look as he could manage he tried to soften the harshness of his former exclamation and said, "For your own safety. I fear perhaps that we have rested too little after our narrow escape from the facility on the planet."

"Oh, I—" Keller stuttered, and immediately he saw she began a visual appraisal of his physical condition. He could not stop the hungering growl that gathered in the back of his throat but even were he to reach out; use Keller to subdue his rising sexual need, it would likely be more savage and brutal than she would be able to survive… and there was still the other consideration to pursue.

"I must feed," he said, irrevocably reminding her that he was Wraith, "and you must rest. I will send someone to see to the needs of your own nutrition."

With the slightest inclination of his body, almost a small bow, he took a step back, and then turned and quickly exited the lab.

Keller frowned as she watched him go. She was not convinced. There was more that was bothering Todd than he had let on. She was certain of it.

Her eyes were drawn to the darkened monitor beside her and she was suddenly sure that whatever was troubling him, she would likely find the answers in whatever data he had, albeit smoothly, hidden from her.

She knew she did not have much time, if she wanted to understand she would have to take the data with her. Study it later, when she could be sure she would not be disturbed, and with that thought she glanced toward the door, expecting at any moment that it would open, and whatever Wraith Todd had assigned to her comfort would storm in, full of resentment as they all were, except perhaps Kenny, of her presence on the Hive and in his laboratory, involved in his research.

Another thought struck her as she began to search around for a data chip that would not be missed, onto which she could download the data before any of the Wraith arrived. What if Todd's consternation was caused by an inability to find a solution to Sheppard's problem among the many files they had stolen from Michael's system? It was a thought that didn't sit well with her, and she hurriedly pressed the key to activate the screen for only long enough to highlight the data and send it to the chip she pushed home, disabling the screen once more when the door opened.

"Doctor Keller." She was both relieved and worried when Kenny stepped into the laboratory. It would not be easy to pass the slight of hand she would require to remove the data chip unnoticed by Kenny. "The Commander is indisposed and has instructed I see to your needs. Tell me, what I may bring to ensure your comfort."

"It's all right," she started to tell him. "I'm not hungry." Her churning belly rumbled, belying her words, and she gave Kenny an apologetic smile. "Or perhaps I am. Whatever you bring, I'm sure it will be fine."

Kenny nodded respectfully and something about the tilts of his head; the expression on his face made Keller smile. She thanked him softly, starting to turn back to the computer console to retrieve the chip.

"I do not think so, Doctor," she jumped as Kenny's hand closed around her arm just as she would have reached for it. She felt a rising heat rush upward to bite at the tips of her ears, certain that she had been discovered, so she almost cried with relief when Kenny continued. "The Commander was most insistent that you went to your rest. He requires your mind fresh when you return to your tasks together."

"Go then," he said, almost softly, and nodded toward her adjacent quarters. "I will return shortly with nourishment for you."

Cursing her ill luck, she began to move, Kenny's fingers still closed around her forearm as he moved with her at first. His touch, though insistent, was light enough to take into account that she was not Wraith; careful not to bruise her. His apparent concern touched her. Once she was on her way, he let go, allowing her to make her own way toward her quarters. She took a breath. Once he was gone to get the food, she would come back and retrieve the chip.

"Doctor Keller," she froze when he called her name, suddenly afraid that he had read her mind. With another breath she turned around to face him, an awkward smile on her face. "I believe you have forgotten something."

Her mouth began to water with the suddenly nauseous feeling as he crossed toward her, and in his hand he held the data chip from the console. Fixing her in place with his light golden eyes, he set the warmed material into her hand, and carefully closed her fingers around it.

Todd threw back his head and roared, matching the young queen's feline snarl as he wrapped her hair around his fist, pulling back her head.

Subdued, she was at his mercy now, her feeding hand lay quiescent against his chest, and she was breathing hard as her snarl faded, as he looked down on her where she lay, supine beneath him; her life, his.

He wrenched his bloodied feeding hand from between them, the wounds on his own chest already healing beneath her hand. Hers would be slower to heal, he knew, as her body's generative energies were concentrated on a much more vital task.

Finally lowering his head to her exposed throat, he breathed in deeply of the scent streaming from her, already changing in the aftermath of their mating. Slowly he closed his teeth on the side of her neck, both marking her and delivering, in his saliva, the hormone that would calm her, bring her Zenith to an end and prevent her body from rejecting the litter of sub-commanders that would be kindled from this union, until the Hive readied the pods for them.

The young queen mewled a little, and curled aside as he pulled away from her to stalk naked to the bathing pool. Need still raged within him, almost a loneliness that sang through his blood. She had given to him, opened to him all that she had; that she was; given the past of her line and he had simply accepted, allowing her to bind herself to him, but giving no such allegiance in return.

He would not; could not, and now he needed the touch of the one to whom he was bound, or at the very least, some semblance of it from the other that was his concubine.

Later, he would think on all that he had seen, all that he had learned from the young queen of her origins and the interdiction that had been broken in her creation, for now he needed only to attempt to relax; free himself from the lingering touch of this Hive's new Queen.

Acutely aware of the fact that the Queen would soon join him in the laboratory, the Hive Second looked down on the unfortunate creature that had once been one of the most gifted scientists the Wraith had ever known. He was a puzzle, with many pieces that the Second had not yet grasped, to slow into place. Perhaps this would give him the opportunity to finish the picture… or perhaps it would be the herald of another heedless, pointless death among their already depleted number.

Slowly he leaned down over the former scientist, searching his face for any sign of a break in the otherwise stoic sufferance under which this one was existing. He found nothing.

"A master of self control," he purred softly. "But… I wonder what it is you conceal."

"Spare me. You are here to bend me to her will," the former scientist hissed, "nothing more. So tell me then… what will you do… when you fail? What price will you pay?"

"By what arrogance do you believe that I will fail?" The Hive Second knew that by answering as he had, he was engaging in the same, manipulative dance in which the others that had been sent to extract information or exact punishment on this one had participated. He knew that he should not, but the process of the other's mind, revealed in the harsh intrinsic refusal to engage, fascinated him.

The Hive Second tilted his head, "The others all tried… physical injury. So crude – so… unnecessary."

Surprisingly the scientist chuckled as he asked, "And you think you have another way?"

The mental push was subtle at first, but not so undetectable that Michael did not immediately realise, and try to hastily erect greater defences. Even as mentally adept as he was – as he had been – he was not fast enough to stave of the brunt of what came next.

A terrible, relentless pushing; a white hot needle of the purest force in a Wraith mind Michael had ever felt burst against every shield he had in place, seeking, searching with crushing mercilessness, firing every nerve and every neuron in his entire system.

Even as he cried out, and arched his back against the inferno searing his body, he fought… fought with everything he was – pushing back, turning what he could in a reciprocal assault against the Hive Second.

A wall of livid purple fury rushed at him, over him and pushed him back, back behind the broken, chipped wall of countless, pointless images, the memories of thousands of centuries of painful machinations until the other's voice sounded almost clear within his mind.

Even the scientist's mental voice held the pain of their battle, like a wounded animal, fighting its way out of a corner, scarred, angry… afraid. He was hiding something more, something greater than the science the Hive Second found at the surface, just behind the shielding barriers it cost the other so much to maintain.

{you will not prevail. she is stronger than you, will be your end. you were a fool to come here!}

The scientist snarled, obviously gathering the desperation his pain afforded him and using it to push back, to try and thread between the woven strands of the Hive Second's defences.

The Hive Second growled, leaning closer to the scientist, feeling the insidious burrowing of the other's mind, deterring and distracting him with words.

"It is only a simple thing she asks of you, one simple thing and then all of this is over… done. You can be fre—"

"There is no freedom in death!" The scientist roared, and against the spasms of muscle, and sinew, stretched his clawed fingers, digging his nails into the surface of the biogenetic bed, keening in pain.

Nothing Michael could do would control the searing agony. He fought his bonds, gouged at the surface on which they confined him, driven almost to insanity by it, and still he could not let them win… and he could still sense her nearby… watching… silent.

He longed for nothing more than to lash out, bury the sharpness of his claws in her soft throat and rip it away; could almost feel the blood, her blood, hot and satisfying, bathing his burning body – soothing the fire.

Like the sudden prickling burn that had assaulted him before, in his own place, as he sought to control his own DNA; reverse the damage the Lanteans had done to his Wraith inheritance, and the terrible devastation one simple miscalculation on his part had wrought as he compounded Beckett's destructive error.

The fatigue, the smouldering listlessness and sickness it had caused him, and his singular, frustrating inability to repair the harm, no matter what he tried – even to the use of the pluripotent stem cells of the infant's cord blood, infused with the remnants of the last of his preserved DNA… no choice then. Only the DNA of his Que—

"No!" he roared, and threw all of his weight behind the force of his roll toward the Hive Second, the restraint tearing his wrist as it buckled and rent in two, a clean slice, almost deep enough…

The Hive Second barely caught sight of the clawed hand sailing his way as he turned his head slightly when the hot, wet liquid fell against his cheek. He blocked with the wrist of his own left hand, sharp, metal tipped fingers then leading his own attack to pin the scientist in place once again, his strength piercing the other's flesh.

His face mere inches away from the scientist, he pushed still harder, forcing his way along pathways that lead to the sudden questions those things he had seen in the other's mind had kindled in him. He felt the discomfort, almost pain as the scientist fought his mental intrusion, valiantly, anchoring himself around synapses, plundering thoughts that the Hive Second sought quickly to shield with defences of his own. Still he searched and sought for answers…

The Hive Second growled softly, tightening his hold as the scientist's desperate anger increased, his strength, drawing energy from his situation, increasing as the Second's mind swept through thought after memory. There was an infant… a child that, not only had this one tried to shield it from his searching, but which the very knowledge of its existence sat uneasily within the Queen's mind also.

The Hive Second frowned, almost pulled away, glancing at the Queen and wondering if he would find more understandable, more sensible answers in her psyche than in the rapidly fracturing awareness in which he had immersed himself.

Suddenly the grip on his own mind tightened, a sharpness of pain running through him… as if in warning, as if to deter his becoming too close to some truth the other did not want him to see.

Threat and warning washed over him amid the sharpening pain as still he pushed and the memory shifted…

"So…" the Hive Second gasped as he struggled with the scientist now, minds locked in the bitterness of the refusal to surrender to the other, to fail. "He was the child's biological progenitor… but what of the mother…?"

Irrational fury and hatred for the Hive Second flared to almost consume him at the mention of Teyla. She was already gone – long cold in death by now. This one could do nothing to harm her now.

Emotional agony rushed in to fill the void left by the physical, and snarling denial as the Second tried to pull from his mind an image of her, Michael lashed out with the full force of his mind as he sought to tear through the elaborate mental shielding erected by this Wraith. Who was he – how were his abilities so strong? So deadly?

He met the defensive force without retreat, his mind straining, pushing on in spite of the certainty he felt that the Hive Second was beyond him… an understanding strengthened by the horrifying and spreading weakness that rushed through his body.

Suddenly he could not breathe, he could not move, the sounds of the Hive deadened in an instant, drowned by his own labouring heartbeat. Still he pushed…

…a deeper, sharper pain… as his push met the angry interdiction, refusal, rejection… and then…

The queen stepped closer as The Abomination fell away from his struggles with the Hive Second… slumped to stillness, a thin trail of straw coloured fluid seeping from the sensory pits of the creature's slack face.

Softly she growled as the Hive Second straightened. His eyes bloodshot from the need to feed, brought on by what she knew had been a bitter, ruinous struggle.

"Now," she said, her self-satisfaction muted at the thought of what her desires had cost her. "We can begin."

The sensation came to her again from the depth of the broken dream. It was like an ache tugging at the edges of an acrid breath that covered her, smothered her in that consuming restlessness. Keller breathed in deeply as she came awake, her eyes opening to the dim light in her room. The scent of warm leather and a biting, heady, musky spice surrounded her, invading what space inside of her was not already filled with the burning of her existence.

His hand was in her hair again and in the pain of his closeness, Keller turned her head toward the touch, and stretched out a hand, reaching, reaching up…

Her fingers tangled in his hair, her nails raking against his scalp, drawing a hissed breath from him as she wrapped her hand in it, and arching toward him, drew him down. Her lips closed over his, crushing, desperate as her blunt teeth pulled them, her tongue drawing a scalding line over them. Todd could taste her; her needs – a heady intoxication and he opened to the kiss, plunging his tongue inside of her mouth and drinking deeply of her.

Her silent moan buzzed against the contact of their lips' conjoined sensitivity. The aching brushed at the edges of where he began reaching, painfully, with an unfulfilled mind to brush the edges of hers. He moved then, settled the hard length of all of him over her petite frame, pinning her… kept from him still by the rough press of the blankets.

The desperation pooled in a burning reservoir behind her eyes and in the swollen liquid feel of her sex as she tried to move beneath him. Empty and needing to be filled, and detesting the want that drove her trembling hands to seek the buckle of his coat and twist it free, she gasped as he broke the kiss and sank his teeth into the top of her shoulder. She arched against him and he pulled back enough that her fluttering hands could free the fastening of his coat… shaking with half realised sobs at the ache that spread from the bite to caress her centre with the imagined, longed for touch.

Keller lay, panting… breathless as Todd shrugged off the heavy leather coat and pulled the shirt off over his head… risen over her like some great dark sun.

The fall of leather onto the floor of the Hive, like the slap she had wanted, so badly, to land so many days before. Instead she reached for him again, pulled him closer, her hands like ice while the rest of her burned with fever.

She pulled him back to her, the blanket now rough against his skin. The aching emptiness inside of him swirled and danced as he reached for the almost-relief of Keller's presence, and growling he plundered a kiss again, tasting her blood as he nipped her swollen lips in his hungry need.

The risen length of him pulsed and strained against the tight leather that held him, and he pulled away from the kiss, his eyes seeking hers, finding her pupils wide and dark, the colour of her irises hidden in her desire. Todd fell into them as Keller slowly ran her fingertips along the Wraith spiral at his shoulder that trailed characters along his arm as though by her touch, she could read him. Slowly she trailed the touch across his wrist, to cup his feeding hand in her palm. She turned her head to their joined hands and moaning softly nipped at the heel of his.

His head fell back, and the hissing, primal growl came from deep in his core as the hot, wet press of her tongue ran along the puckered length of his feeding slit, filling his palm with the aching burn of necessity, of need denied, and when at last she ceased her almost tender assault, and he could look on her once more, she had drawn aside the blanket from between them.

The enzyme burned her throat as she swallowed, raising her head from his hand to find his eyes, almost pleading with him, her skin prickled with gooseflesh at the change as she pulled the blanket aside.

A dizzying, vital swirling possessed her as his eyes, starving for contact, ran upward on her body. She all but felt his gaze, like a touch over the mound of her sex, where it lay, uncovered by the shirt she wore, when she had writhed beneath him. He reached for her, his clawed hand tearing at the shirt, as his eyes still climbed the creamy planes of her belly, her breasts, swollen and exquisitely painful in need of his touch.

She gave a soft cry as he met her need, and she felt the delicate, almost teasing draw of his feeding hand as he ran its deadly touch over her breasts and belly… not enough… not enough to more than magnify her resolute need, the memory of the feel of him inside of her.

She reached to press her hand hard against the swell of him that she could feel against the leather that pressed against her hip… meaning to give to him the maddening ache of barely held, primal impulse.

His feeding hand skimmed low over her belly, and she moaned, long and low as his fingers parted the silk softness of her soaked folds.

Todd glided his touch over the surface of her, pressed into her as deep as he could reach and she arched her back to bring his touch deeper still. Her essence drenched him, saturated his feeding slit as he opened to taste her, draw her deeper into him, running the length of it over her swollen clitoris as he withdrew the touch from inside. Maddeningly slowly he repeated the motion, pushing his touch deep inside as he tasted the erect nub of her desire, tight with all the control he could muster as he poised on the edge of feeding from her there.

She cried out, and he growled in answer as she ground her hips, her muscles tight around him, as hungry and as needful as the lightning storm that raged inside of him, until he drew the torturous touch away from her.

A moment of stillness… of breathless silence as he drew away to free himself from the rest of his clothing… still pulsing with the feel of her, the taste of her… the need.

Keller reached for him as he returned, as his hard fingers grasped her hips. She framed him with her knees and guided the thick length of him to find her open and wanting. He growled as he filled her, and she answered with a moan as the length of him, his ridges almost counting each of her muscles, tremulous around him, possessed the whole of her. There was a difference this time… something that lay over him that she had never before seen in him, no matter how often he had come to her and she had given herself to him.

The sharp agony of his spreading glans inside the very depth of her brought the deep, hot flush of trembling along her limbs, squeezing the muscles around him and driving him deeper still. She cried out, and pushed her hips against him, the pain of it leaving her needing fulfilment, reaching for more, and growling he began to move.

Slow and deliberate, leaning down to nip at her shoulder once more, Todd undulated over her, barely at first, and then with growing completeness… of abandonment and possession each in turn, and sobbing with the need of it she met the rise and fall of his hips with her own. Each of them reaching, burning, and desperately answering the passion of their needs.

There wasn't a part of Todd that didn't hunger with it… ache with it… his muscles trembling with reaching for a part of him that was denied by time and distance… like a rage growing inside of him, he strained and fought against the agony of the missing.

Sweet sensations, the feel of the trembling clasp of Keller's sex around him, the soft wetness of her spilling onto his swelling sacs as the press of their bodies together caressed him bringing him closer to bright agony of release… of longing to fill her with his heat, his life… to hear her cry as he would bring her relief from the terrible consuming ache he knew she shared.

Keller raised her hips to meet his, encouraging, needful, as if she were striving to meet his demands… reaching for the moment that seemed always out of reach. She was breathing hard, her muscles tightening, squeezing him, moving and playing over his ridges even as she cried out in answer to his sudden deeper thrusts. Wanting more that he so badly needed to give.

He slipped a hand under the small of her back, and possessed her deeper, until her cries became growls of need and he rose over her again, his feeding hand still wet with her juices pressed against her chest… filled with the tingling aching hunger he longed to obey.

Her answering deeply primal moan broke over him as a storm driven wave, and snarling, he threw back his head, fully open inside of her and came hard… milked hotly by her answering, shattering climax.

Still wracked by the trembling pulsing climax that had ripped through her, breathless and all but sobbing with the aftermath of it, Keller drew his head down to rest against her breast.

But for their ragged breathing, there was silence, no need to voice the truth. Her hand trembled, and she felt an agony of confusion as she raised it to gently comb her fingers through his hair.

Not moving, save for the rise and fall of his tattered breath, he swallowed hard, tasting the slight coppery scent amid the mingling of their essences. He tried to raise his head, but her fingers running in his hair held him close against her breast. He opened his mind to reach for comfort in the insipid almost of the present, then rumbling with the pain of comfortlessness, tried to reach beyond to the one…

…but instead there was darkness as exhaustion crept over him, as Keller's fingers, too, stilled.

The awareness of something intangible, ineffable, woke him suddenly. It was early, and Keller still slept soundly, half uncovered, at his side. He leaned over her, meaning to cover her, knowing she had on more than one occasion complained of the temperature aboard the Hive… but stopped as he grew closer, running his hand down the length of her narrow back, and over her hips. Tilting his head he took in a slow, deep breath, letting out a rumbling growl as he finally moved back, covering her almost gently, before rising from the bed, and beginning to make himself presentable, and to dress.

It was time to rid himself of those of the Humans he no longer wanted or needed aboard his Hive. Silently, he sent the command to return to within the network of portals, and to set a course for the nearest world possessing a portal. It would not take them long to reach it.

Jennifer knew even as she woke that she would ache more than she ever had before, and she was not mistaken. She made a soft sound as she began to sit up, some way between a gasp and a moan, and instinctively knew that Todd had turned toward her from where he stood, dressed in only his pants and undershirt.

"You should have woken me," she told him, starting to get up, grabbing the robe that had somehow appeared beside the bed. "We have a lot of work to do."

"Hmm," he said with a little shrug of his shoulders, "you should rest. We are already en route back into the vicinity of the… Stargates, as you call them."

"You're kidding me, no?" Jennifer said, half kneeling on the bed, one foot on the floor as she fastened the robe about herself. "We haven't finished he— there yet. We didn't take environmental samples, didn't find the boy's father to take DNA samples from him…"

"We have what we need, Jennifer," Todd said firmly. She'd learned that when he used that tone he was not usually amenable to persuasion. That morning, it irritated her.

"Then what about Sheppard?" she asked, standing on both feet and beginning to walk toward Todd. "Did we find anything that we can adapt to reverse what the other Michael did to him?"

Todd looked at her for a moment, his head tilted as though he was trying to make a decision, and then he spoke.

"The retrovirus that the one from the alternate existence used to infect Sheppard is practically a reversal of the original retrovirus used by your Doctor Beckett, weak, and impermanent." He shrugged again, adding dismissively, "I could have cured him the moment he came aboard my Hive."

"Without the serum we have been giving him he would have long since reverted to his original state and by now recovered from any lingering weakness," he said. "The pain he was feeling was the beginning of that process – a useful barometer for measuring when an additional dose of the serum was needed."

"You must understand, Jennifer," Todd told her conversationally, as though he saw nothing wrong with what he'd done. "The importance of our mission—"

"You had me injecting Sheppard with a serum that halted his recovery from this thing?" she said. Her colour rose exponentially to her anger as her mind started to put all of the pieces together. "Made me your accomplice in this… this…"

"I told you," Todd started, but she didn't want to hear him make whatever his excuse for this inexcusable betrayal sound reasonable… acceptable. She wasn't going to let him manipulate her any more.

Her mind was racing, and it didn't take her long to determine the reason. Of course, keeping Sheppard out of the way, keeping him weak and unable to intervene strengthened Todd's position. Sheppard, the one person she might have been able to go to. McKay, though he meant well, was not the one to confront Todd about anything that circumstances and Todd's calculating manner had brought her to until she was powerless, no worse than that, complicit in his complete dominant possession of her.

She heard him move closer and spun on his, pure vitriol as she spat, "Don't you touch me, you bastard! There's been more than enough of that!"

"Your nothing!" she all but screamed at him, and launched herself toward him, her hands slapping against his chest with such force she felt him almost move a step back, and the jarring force ached against her wrist and shoulders. Undeterred, her eyes burning with the anger, the hate she felt for him in that moment – but more for herself – driving her on. She pushed him again, slapping her hand against his immovable chest. "You used me… manoeuvred me into every part of your… your… sick little— what is it with you, Todd, a game?"

He growled softly, but made no other answer, as he slowly started to wrap his mind into hers. Her anger was a danger to her, a danger he could not allow. Taking a step closer he walked right into the next of her furious slaps. It connected with his face. Such an action was unacceptable, but circumstances were different.

As his mind touched hers, as he reached for her wrists to restrain her, she pushed at him again and he felt her emotions coming to a peak. A whirl of boiling fury aimed his way but turned against herself.

"Listen to me," he rumbled, but he knew even as he spoke that his words were nowhere near to reaching her. She fought him, slapping away his hands as he reached for her, and again he allowed it, for the moment. She could do him little harm in any case, but if she would not calm then he would have no other choice but to enforce his restraint… for her own safety.

"I should have known!" she hiccupped, pausing in her relentless attempts to land her fists against his chest hard enough to move him. Angry tears began falling from her eyes, staining her reddened cheeks, and she forced more words through a choked throat. "From the moment you contacted me, you played me… backed me into a fucking corner with nowhere to go, you… bastard, you… fucker… you… you cunt!"

She screamed the words into his face as he finally took hold of her flailing wrists, bending closer to her to do so, and through the connection with her tumultuous mind the meaning of her words assaulted him full force. Pulling her closer, he shook her slightly.

"No," he said firmly, repeating the motion. "I spoke only the truth when I contacted you in Atlantis. Your acumen is impressive, my Jennifer, and from the moment I realised more of you, I wanted you."

She tried to look away, but he shifted his grasp to take both wrists into one hand and grasp her chin, bringing her reluctant gaze back to meet with his.

"No," she moaned, wrenching her hands free, heedless of the scratches his fingers must have caused, to slap him again and again, before he pulled her closer again, holding her struggling form against his, tipping back her head, and capturing her lips in a crushing kiss.

She fought him still, but her struggles slowed, the fists she pushed against his shoulders opened slowly, grasped the fabric of his shirt and clung to him, trembling as she surrendered to the kiss, until the arm he slipped around her narrow waist supported her fully as the exhaustion of the fight claimed what was left of her strength.

Slowly, he brought the intense kiss to an end, and growling softly in concern, as still she wept against his shoulder as he lifted her, entirely without effort, into his arms, he carried her toward the bed and set her down gently.

"Believe what you wish, my Jennifer," he told her softly, "but the truth will become apparent in time. Rest."

The young queen swayed as she made her way slowly across the room, and he thought she looked as sick as any he had ever seen in her gestational need. Worried she would falter, lose consciousness before she even reached the chamber he had taken great pains to prepare, the Second hurried toward her and caught her arm as she moaned softly, fighting to keep to her feet.

"It is time, my Queen," he said in soft respect, nodding to his own subordinate commander, who came to the queen's other side. "You cannot hold them any more, lest you endanger both them, and yourself. Your symbiosis is at an end. Come."

Together he and the other Wraith commander assisted the queen toward the chamber. Lying horizontally, already it was part filled with luminous blue fluid, its base already writhing with tendrils, oozing viscous enzyme in their almost desperate thrashing.

"Wh—where are my attendants?" the queen demanded, but there was no strength in her voice.

Carefully he helped her to climb the steps, and then step down into the chamber, lifting off the robe that had covered her as his assistant supported her when she lowered herself into the luminous fluid.

Immediately the thrashing among the tendrils began to increase, each of them moving as if searching, brushing against the queen, seeking contact.

"Release them to the Hive," the Second hissed softly as the first of the tendrils joined with her.

"Now I know you're out of your mind," Sheppard offered, turning suddenly from packing what few belongings he had brought aboard the Hive to glare at Todd suspiciously. "She's coming with us."

"Sheppard," Todd said, "Our research is far from at an end, the benefits to both of us could be… enormous."

"With us. Back to Atlantis. End of subject." Sheppard spelled it out in no uncertain terms.

Ever since Todd had finally found the cure to his hybridisation, Sheppard had been unable to shake the feeling that there was something else going on, some hidden agenda on the Wraith's part and he was certain that he wasn't going to like it if he found out what it was. Better for all of them then if they left the Hive sooner rather than after any kind of delay… and that had been when Todd had informed him that he would rather Keller remain behind to continue their joint research.

Sheppard had tried to talk to Keller about it, to actually find out whether she thought it would be beneficial, and even now he couldn't believe that he had even considered the proposal, but Keller had been unwilling to discuss the matter, and seemed somewhat out of sorts… stressed.

Todd rumbled, and Sheppard knew he was about to say something, to argue, and he was ready for whatever he had to do or say to the Wraith to make him understand that there was no way in hell he was leaving Jennifer behind, when the illumination in the Hive dimmed to near darkness, and the organic hum of the hyperspace engines ceased abruptly as the Hive instantly dropped back into normal space.

Instead, Sheppard looked up at Todd and demanded, "What the fuck is going on, Todd?"

The young queen moaned and hissed as the genetic material of her young was excised from her swollen body by the action of the fluids and the enzymes secreted into the fluid, transported by the tendrils and tubules to the waiting generative pods. There they would complete their gestation, supported by the Hive, part of the Hive as much as its consciousness would be a part of them.

The Second gave his silent command into the mind of the obedient sub-commander, watching as he exited the incubation room before he closed to lock the door behind him.

"So, my Queen," he said softly as he returned, looking down on where she lay, unable to move, completely at his mercy, and at the mercy of the orders given to him by his commander. There was no question of his loyalty, not in this matter. "You and your ignorant dam think you can bring to us the beginnings of all that is to come?"

There was a good deal of contempt in his voice, equal contempt with which his commander had spoken with him of this one, and the young he had sired on her. There was much work to be done, and he felt a flush of unexpected pride that he had been sufficiently trusted to be the one to undertake its inception.

Todd reached out mentally, interfacing with the semi-sentient heart of the Hive. He was almost certain he knew why the Hive had dropped out of hyperspace, and was diverting almost all power away from non-essential systems, but he wanted to be sure that his suspicions were correct. They were and his smile was feral as he answered Sheppard.

Sheppard lunged at him before he could even finish the half truth, and still partly linked with the Hive as he was, Todd was somewhat caught unawares and had been driven back against the bulkhead, with his own knife held at his throat in Sheppard's hand.

"Stop lying to me, you son-of-a-bitch!" Sheppard spat. "There's something going on here. You've been working to some kind of agenda that you've tried to keep hidden from all of us, and I swear, Todd, if I find out that any of what all this is about," he gestured briefly around the room with the knife before bringing it quickly back to Todd's throat, "any of what you've done these last few weeks has hurt Keller, I will hunt you down, and I will kill you!"

"Really, Sheppard," he purred, steeling his temper, burying it under layers of sarcasm, "I fail to see what you could possibly think I have done that could have hurt any of you, particularly Doctor Keller. Are you not cured? Have we not, Jennifer and I, advanced our understanding of the Hoffan Syndrome, and the process by which a solution could be reached?"

"To what end?" Sheppard demanded, and in an action Todd saw born of angry contempt, the man pushed away from him, and tossed the blade to the ground beneath them before walking away, running his hand through his short Human hair. "I mean, yeah, I get you need to find a way to save your people from dying because of feeding but… why go running all the way to some… backwater planet on Michael's say-so. You clearly hate him – you're enemies, so why the hell trust anything you find from him. It doesn't make any sense."

He did not care that she was watching him… or that she had seen, albeit briefly, the utter contempt with which he viewed her, and the position she so tenuously held. The Second pulled the cap from the first of the syringes his Commander had given him, and inserted the needle carefully into the tendril supplying life support to one of the embryonic Wraith.

Stepping away from the bulkhead wall, Todd leaned down to retrieve the knife and slip it back into the sheath at his waist. As he straightened up, he met and held Sheppard's eyes and purred a single word.

Finding a way past the pain at last, a way to reach the Second's mind, the young queen finally completed her answer to his former question.

"You sent for me," Isla said softly as she let herself into the Elder Hive Second's quarters.

"Come, Isla," he said quietly, and without turning he held out his hand to her. "I have need of your comfort."

Even as she crossed the room to where he was sitting she could see the tension in his shoulders, the way it took great effort to hold his arm so straight for so long. She slipped her hand into his, and offered none of the usual hesitancy a worshipper might give as he drew her round to stand before him.

"You are weary," she observed softly, tilting her head to the side. "Allow me to draw a bath for you."

"In a while," he answered quietly, and drew her hand toward his face, to nip lightly at her wrist as he guided her fingers into his hair.

Understanding his unspoken desire, Isla deftly began to remove the tight braids from his hair, and he drew her closer still to rest his head on her shoulder as she did. For just a moment she felt the pain that was roiling through his head and down into his spinal column, and in answer to her unspoken question, received an impression of the one the Wraith of this Hive called 'The Abomination.'

"He is far from that, Isla," The Hive Second murmured, his breath fluttering like wings over her bare shoulder. "It is ignorance by which they name him such."

"More than that," the Hive Second said, lifting his head from her shoulder, and looking at her in earnest, fixing her with his bloodshot, golden eyes. He whispered, "He understands."

Her hair still dripping from the long, hot bath she'd taken – not the first by any stretch of the imagination – Keller wrapped herself in the enormous purple bath-robe, letting its softness caress the remaining scratches and bruises, and padded barefoot into the adjacent room of her quarters.

It was late, and she knew she should be sleeping, but as she moved toward the bed her eyes fell on the Wraith data chip that she had brought with her from Todd's Hive containing several of the more useful pieces of Michael's data that McKay had managed to decrypt, and also the data that he had tried to conceal from her.

Quickly grabbing a towel to wrap around her hair, she turned on her laptop, and plugged in the hardware that would allow her to read the Wraith data chip, hardly even waiting for the computer to finish booting up before she pushed the chip home and called up the file.

As the computer ran the decode and decrypt program she pulled the towel from around her hair and started to rub it dry, glancing absently at the pages as they were displayed briefly before moving on to the next. She recognised the genome maps, and computer simulation mapping with a certain degree of bored resignation. If she were going to crack the problem of curing the sickness caused by exposure to the Hoffan drug using the research she had undertaken with Todd while aboard his Hive, she would need to go through many more of those maps in much greater detail. The prospect did not fill her with contentment.

The computer flashed to another screen and a new set of maps, and simulations that ran, and instinctively she recognised the distinctive pattern of her own DNA, but the other… and the one running in the simulation…?

Before she could make sense of it, the screen flashed on, decrypting more of the file. She reached out quickly and stabbed at the keyboard in an attempt to halt the computer's progress and make it go back to the previous screen.

"No, no, no, no, no," she spoke urgently to the computer as though appealing to it would make it cooperate, "Wait a second, I wasn't done with that—"

As the screen turned back, as her eyes finally managed to take in the information from the maps and the simulation, she gripped the wet towel tightly in her hands. She could not feel its soft sodden fibres. Her hands felt numb, the first sign of her gathering fear as the cold sweat began to drip over her spine, and prickle against her forehead.

Her legs were also numb, and she felt as though ice was flowing through them, not the warmth of her blood, and barely able to stand, let alone balance to pull on her pants and a shirt, she dressed as quickly as she could, and all but ran from her quarters, heading for the infirmary, and the adjacent laboratory.

Scalding dread and a murderous rage gripped Todd as he stormed through the still burning debris of the Ecruo village, a single destination in mind. He jumped, and turning, snarled as a smouldering timber cracked and fell to the ruins of the rest of the building beneath it.

He did not need to see the withered, puckered bodies all but lined up along the route of devastation to know what had happened there. The answer screamed at him from every turn. A rival had done this.

Desperately he reached out along the connection, through his bond to find Alicia, his parmhuna, but the answering touch of her mind was tenuous at best, and failing fast.

Slowing his steps, his pounding heart marking time against the backdrop of damage that had once been the village of worshippers at the heart of his feeding grounds, Todd rounded on the sub-commander that came to deliver his report. He knew from the other's mind that the news would be bad even before the other Wraith opened his mouth to speak.

"We have searched. There are no signs of survivors," the other Wraith took a hasty step backwards as Todd snarled. "The likelihood is that—"

"I know what is likely!" he roared, reaching out, pure lightning in his anger, to grasp his underling by the throat. "Do not lecture me like some… barely hatched drone!"

"Find the one responsible!" Todd spat, and released the other Wraith without another word, knowing he would be obeyed. He did not have time for this. Barely a thread of the once strongly tangible connection with Alicia remained and every muscle in his body constricted painfully.

Ronon sighed as Woolsey's voice cut across the hum of the deactivating gate. The base commander was the last person Ronon wanted to talk to, and he wondered what he'd done wrong this time.

"Professor Varnerin informed me that you have been out looking for Teyla – that she's not with her people," Woolsey said.

Ronon frowned, wondering how in the name of the ancestors they'd got wind of that snippet of information, until he realised it was probably from Zelenka. He wanted to be angry with the Czech, but he knew that Radek would only have been trying to help find her. It was his own fault for involving the scientist in the first place.

"I've been looking for Teyla, yeah," he said, giving Woolsey a challenging look, all but daring him to ask why.

Ronon sighed again, becoming smothered by his worry. She was not in any of the places he had looked for her, and there was no way for him to know, wherever she was, that she was well. Wordlessly he shook his head.

"I worry about her, yeah," Ronon answered, and he made it more than clear in his tone that he would not hear a word spoken against her.

"Yeah, you did," Ronon cut him off. "You both did, and I'm telling you, if there's any reason she left her people it's because she's trying to find her son - nothing more."

"All right," Woolsey said, "I believe you – but where does that leave us in respect of finding her?"

"You can't," Ronon said, and his heart fell as he realised it was the truth. "She's nowhere. I visited her friends, went back to M5B-217, even tried going back to Athos."

"Yeah," Ronon rumbled, "The shrine to her parents is there after all. I thought—"

"Well… I suppose we'll have to assume that no news is good news," the base commander said with what Ronon supposed was supposed to be a reassuring smile. In this instance, however, he rather doubted that the Earth Human's idiom would hold. He had a very bad feeling lodged deep inside his heart.

The stench of blood, both older and new, assaulted him more strongly as he pushed his way into the cabin… other scents too, strong and sickly – scents that brought a greater anger still upon his already wounded psyche.

Even in the half-light he spotted her immediately, lying on the blood-soaked hearth where the remnants of the fire barely smouldered. Her clothing was torn, and scratches, gouges stood livid against the white flesh of her belly, her thighs and shoulders, and bites descended from her all but torn throat – down over the front of her body, not sparing the soft mounds of her breasts.

"Alicia," he could not stop her name escaping from his lips, desperate and broken, and came to his knees at her side, reaching for her, to cradle her closer against him even as the scent of another Wraith's fulfilment strengthened – sensed even before he saw the viscous splash of clearing milky, enzyme filled fluid coating her hip and her belly.

She made no sound as he tried to wrap her in the remnants of her torn clothing, seeking to warm her, reaching for her neck to assure him that she yet lived. Desolation lodged within him, pulling him down, threatening to overwhelm him as her dangerously weak pulse fluttered against his fingers.

Todd put back his head, snarling and keening in one and the same moment… certain in that moment that he knew the one responsible.

Keller could barely keep her hand steady enough to avoid opening a huge gash in the blood vessel raised by the tourniquet as she took her blood sample. Her mouth was alternately desert dry, and sickeningly wet with bile as the thought, the terrifying possibility entered her mind again and again.

Bracing herself against the bench, as her legs barely held her upright, she moved to place the blood sample she had taken into the scanner that would analyse the biochemical contents, providing her with a full blood panel. She would feel better when she had answers – when she knew.

Feeling suddenly faint, and trembling with the effort to hold on to consciousness she hooked the nearby stool with her foot and drew it closer so that she could sit – head in hands.

…snowballed until she was almost sobbing… her chest, painful from it. She slipped from the stool, knocking medical equipment to the floor as she made her way to where the surgical gowns were stored, and pulling one down she began to strip, heedless of whether there were any others present. At the same time, with a hand that trembled almost uncontrollably she fixed her earpiece into place and tapped it several times over to activate it.

"Doctor Meronine," she tried, but was sure she failed, to hide the tears that thickened her voice, "this is Jennifer, report to the infirmary immediately."

"Doctor Keller?" Meronine's voice sounded full of concern as she answered the radio call.

"Please, Angela," Keller barely caught the sob, "Just come. There's something I need you to do. I need you to do it now."

Keller grabbed a surgical directive sheet and in handwriting she was sure would be unrecognisable, she wrote up the order, before she finished getting herself ready for the procedure she had just sanctioned. It was a gross abuse of protocol, and of her authority as CMO, but her terror, mounting by the moment as the soft bleeps of the scanner began to seep into her awareness, demanded nothing less of her.

She crossed the room again, and ripped the hard copy from the printer, twisting the paper over and over until it ripped in her hands, and all but overloading the computer interface in her haste to destroy the electronic copy.

"God, Jennifer!" Doctor Meronine's exclamation made her jump, and the vial containing her blood sample slipped from her fingers to shatter on the hard floor of the laboratory. "Jennifer, what's wrong? Why don't you sit down? I'll clean that up."

As the other doctor tried to move past her, Jennifer gripped her arm as tightly as she could.

"Leave it," she craved desperately and handed her the written order. "I need this procedure. I need you to do it… do it now."

"Jen?" Meronine frowned, her voice full of concern as she cast her eyes over the written sheet. "Jen, are you sure? I didn't even know you were—is this even necessary? We should… we should get you under the scanner first, it might not even be necessary, something this drastic, I mean a D an—"

"No," Keller almost shook the other doctor. "It's the only way, it's been too long already. Please, Angela, don't make me find some way to do this myself."

She was barely breathing. He raised his head from beside hers, where he held her tight against his chest. He was out of time, with only one possible course of action left to him in order to save her life.

Letting out a long, slow breath that trembled with unexpressed emotional pain, rage and something far greater than fear, he steeled himself for what he had to do, and slowly, pushed his feeding hand against her chest.

The life force flowed from him strongly at first, the barbs in his feeding hand anchoring deep as he gave her the Gift, but what should have been a rapturous sharing became the sharp bite of pain in the gland at the head of his shoulder.

He snarled denial against it, continuing, the Gift of Life weaker now as he sought to heal her as much as he was able, until the pain became a paroxysmal agony, and he fell back, away from her, the fall breaking the contact between them, his body trembling – convulsing… dying.

Additional thanks go to Jansma for helping me through a tricky section. Couldn't have done it without you love.

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