She dreams beneath the desert sky, her rivers soon to run dry. The moon is eclipsed by a cloud. She feels like rain. He reaches down and touches her cheek.

Wryly, he admonishes her, 'I did not stop you from running away to Destiny just so you could sacrifice yourself.'

'For one good man. A Protector,' she smiles serenely.

'If I am, it's because you see me that way.'

'Well. Let's take stock, shall we? The singularity is in one piece. The black hole is relatively stable. The galaxy's spin is only off by a small enough difference as to make no difference at all.'

'But we won't be going back to Atlantis anytime soon.'

'We can go anywhere but communicating with them, no. They won't see us again in their lifetimes.' Sleepily, she murmurs in his mind, 'You know, you really didn't have to do all this just to get me alone.'

'You're part of me now.' He gathers her up, nurturing the better part of his nature. 'I'm not letting go.'

McKay wanders down to the power room alone. His excuse is to check on the reserve levels. He could do this from the control room but he needed to get away from everyone else and their ridiculous platitudes.

As soon as Cadman told them what was going on, he knew they wouldn't be back. Right now, he can't deal with it.

He walks in on an astonishing sight. The platform designed to interface ZPMs with Atlantis' power grid has been reconfigured to hold three glowing white spheres.

Sensor scans show they are indeed ZPMs - an advanced design far beyond and more efficient than any of the designs left behind by the Ancients. The power equations indicate that, with judicious use, the spheres will provide the city with power for...let's see, carry the one, ah, just under one hundred million years.

"Holy crap," he gasps and raises his face quickly and expectantly. "Hello?" A moment later, without a response, he mentally kicks himself for being an idiot and goes eagerly back to the tablet, running scenarios.

Behind him, an image of John Sheppard flutters to life. "Rodney."

"Oh my god, you are here."

"Before you start rapid-firing questions - I'm not really here. This is, ah, an interactive hologram program that you invented. Will invent. In the future. One of your possible futures - I hate time travel. Anyway, I didn't think you'd mind if I borrowed it for this.

"Hope you like the redecorating we did - I picked out the colour scheme. Ah, if you're seeing this, you know, blah, blah, Ville and I probably haven't made it back to Atlantis yet. In fact, it might take us a long, long while. So I wanted to say goodbye right this time.

"Take care of our city. Take care of each other." The image begins to fade. "Oh, and go get the girl."

Richard Wolseyís greatest triumph is marred by this tragic news. Earth's Atlantean outpost and the Icarus base have spearheaded an effort to resettle a small colony of Palestinians on JS151967. A bold group no longer content to let politicians and generals dictate their future choose to sever ties with the land of their birth to build that future in a new world.

Evan Lorne pours champagne for himself, his wife Sara and Richard. He toasts, "To Peace."

Richard adds, "To Ville and John, who helped to start us down this path."

"Here, here," Sara echoes the sentiment.

Unobserved, elsewhere in the universe, a star ignites, rather suddenly so on the cosmic scale of things. In relatively short order, a planetary body forms in a 'Goldilocks' orbit about the new star.

The climate is nice, life is abundant but there is no higher intelligence here. Not yet. The single monument anywhere on the planet suggesting intervention, divine or otherwise, is an obelisk that serves as both a lighthouse and a warning that this planet is protected and awaiting its future occupants.

This system has been carefully placed in the path of a ship called Destiny, due to arrive in several million years. Give or take a few.

In the clearing, stands a boxer

And a fighter by his trade

And he carries the reminders

Of every glove that laid him down

Or cut him till he cried out

In his anger and his shame

'I am leaving, I am leaving'

But the fighter still remains.