AN: Yes, it's here, the END! So, big BIG thanks to my betas sholio, linzi and tazmy. I won't bore everyone with too much rambling, but it must be said that without them, this just would not have been what it is, and I am not even sure I would have gotten it written. Linzi's by far the most patient friend ever, for putting up with huge files appearing in her inbox some times several times a day with a pleading, "does this work?" I am a tinkering writer so things were added after my betas looked at this, all remaining mistakes are mine! Thank you so much for giving this story a chance!

Warnings: This chapter begins with what some might call disturbing content, a memory that is of graphic violence and mature topics. Just wanted to give a heads up.

Chapter Five

I had been raised by a kind mother and a gentle father – raised amongst people where violence was the rarity, not the usual. When I was a small child, so young most of my memories remained hidden, there had been a woman that committed a terrible act against her husband and her children.

The venerated and a group of elders, including my father, had found the bodies. They had gone to her home after no one had left well past breakfast, when most had begun to work the ground and the women gathered to laugh and weave cloth.

The woman had sat huddled in the corner, covered in blood. The blood of her family, father had told mother, when he had thought I was sleeping.

She had killed them while they slept.

I remember listening from my bed to the strained words spoken between my parents. Words of the woman being sick inside, that something was wrong with her mind. I remember they had kept the woman for days in her house, guarded by huntsmen, armed with their bows, arrows and knives, because she kept trying to hurt others that came near. She thought everyone meant to do her harm. She had thought her husband and children were planning to kill her, so she stole their life first.

In the end, the venerated decided the woman must be sent to the otherworld, where maybe the ghosts could heal her spirit, because there was nothing more to do for her in our world. She was a danger, like the night predators.

They talked about stories from days long gone to dust, about others who had lost their minds to madness.

I was not supposed to go near her home. I was not supposed to creep through the woods, peer in through the open door while the elders, my father, the venerated, and the village healer went in to loose her soul upon the winds.

But I was curious.

I had been dared by Leom and Kanai to look, and all I had cared about was showing Leom I was not just a stupid girl, with hair bound in leather.

They had held her arms and legs, held her body to her bed. It was stained from before, that night when she had set free the life's blood of her family, and now that same blood had aged, the red turned to an ugly, dirty brown.

The venerated pronounced the judgment – told the wild woman that the spirits might have mercy on her soul, for there was none left in the hearts of our people. They used a knife, sliced the skin on her wrist where life beats the strongest.

Her life's blood surged forth then, with strength. Throughout, the woman fought to get free, accused them of killing her. She fought until her eyes grew heavy, and her limbs grew still, and her life's blood only seeped sluggishly from the deep cut. The soft drips had spattered to the ground, drumbeats against my heart, because I watched while her soul left.

There had been so much blood. Her body's worth. Then, they had left, and put fire to the home, and after, all that remained were stones and terrible memories that haunted my father.

In the turns of day and night following, the adults had talked often and smiled less.

A handful of days later, the man that had used the knife was found in a deep water pool, a rock tied to his feet. Mother had said it was an accident, that he had been trying to weight his fish trap and became tangled, but father had said the man had not been able to live with the awful memory of what he had been asked to do – what he had done. Father said no one should have been asked to take another's life. That it was an abomination.

Was I tainted, then, if I felt no regret for taking the wraith's life? Was I wrong inside, because I had wanted to kill it?

I looked from the body, found Ronon's face again. The fierce mask slipped, revealing the warrior's pain. "They killed my people. Destroyed my world." He offered a simple explanation for the things he did. It was enough to fill my heart with sorrow and regret – for making him live again that pain.

No wonder I had felt a kinship with him – our people had suffered a similar end.

"Killing that wraith did not bring either of your worlds back," Teyla said.

Before I could seek her eyes, to see if I had angered her, she was returning to the ship, striding against the breeze that was only soft enough to ruffle my hair against my shoulders. Ronon thrust his weapon into a holder that he wore on his waist and strapped to his leg, before following her, leaving me standing on the ground, by the body of the dead wraith.

The face was forever etched in the disbelieving look and promise of death that it had thought to deliver to me, before Ronon's weapon had taken its life – and its promises -- away.

Death was forever.

I could not undo my actions, even if I wished it – and I did not.

I believed Sheppard's Teyla was a strong woman, but in this she was wrong. I had not shot that wraith only for revenge.

I would not lie; the ghosts were tumbled in with the other reasons.

I had done it for the ghosts, for the people of this now empty world, for Sheppard and sky eyes and for every life that still lived, because that one monster would not be there to steal it from them.

Still, her disapproval made my feet heavy, and I walked into the ship wishing only to have a place where I could be alone.

The irony was not lost on me. That I had been alone for so long and now craved it. But this time, I knew it would not be forever. I only needed to walk, and someone would be there.

I only wanted time to hide from my confusing feelings, to think about everything I had seen and done since my two males had changed my life. I had cared for them, protected them. I had fought with wraith and remembered my past. Now, I had killed, and I did not regret it.

But there was no joy in my heart.

I felt empty, tired.

Carson stood over Sheppard. They had stretched his long body on the bench, covered him in a blanket of silver. McKay sat across from Sheppard, his face strained and white, his eyes of blue so hollow they glowed. Teyla and Ronon were near the front, still standing, watching their healer work.

"Will he be okay?" Ronon asked.

I ducked around Carson's body and stared at Sheppard. My breath caught in my throat. His lips! They had turned the dusky color of sky when night approaches. I had seen it before in my kind, and in Lilani.

Sheppard was not getting enough air.

"Carson, he is --"

I began to explain, the worry thickening my words, when he met my eyes with sad ones of his own. Of course he knew. Carson was their healer, with magic that I could never fathom.

"I know, he's holding on, Mawani." He turned to go to the cockpit, but paused by McKay. "Keep an eye on him, I think there's blood building in his chest, but I'm going to try and get us to Atlantis. Opening him up here, when he's already sick…"

"Just go," said sky eyes. "Standing here talking is wasting time."

Carson's mouth thinned, but he nodded, and moved with more speed. It was as if everything sped up. The ship responded, lifting quickly into the air, and even though the monster was gone, I still could not enjoy the moment because now I knelt by Sheppard, held his hand and kept urging him to breathe. His eyes fluttered, focused on me, then McKay. "We okay?" he asked, his voice barely a whisper of wind in the trees.

I nodded, biting my lip to keep from crying.

I did not think okay was the word, but I did not want to tell him his lips were blue, and his chest was swelling. I did not want to tell him the wraith had pushed his broken bone into his air cavity and that he was very sick. Instead, I held his cold hand, feeling both shattered and hopeful.

"Atlantis, this is Doctor Beckett – we have a medical emergency!"

The words floated to my ears and meant nothing.

Their time passed so quickly compared to my time. Before they had come, a day had stretched before me, long and slow. Now, everything moved fast, on the wings of a bird, flying from one moment to the next. The ship went through the odd ring, the Stargate, but like before, I was too worried and lost in thought to understand what was happening until it was over. It was a bite of cold, nothingness then thought returned.

I wanted to tell them to hurry, because Sheppard's pulse stuttered against my skin. His eyes blinked, closed, tried to open again, before they drifted shut for a final time and did not open again.

"Sheppard!" I rubbed his chest like I had done before and got no response. "McKay, his pulse – it is gone!" Fear gripped my soul.

"Bloody hell, Colonel!"

Someone pulled me away, though I did not let go easily. I tried to rush back to him, to urge Sheppard to breathe, but the hold was strong and I realized why – Ronon. McKay shook his head at me when I tried to shake free. The ship had stopped moving, the door opened and people rushed in. So many, many people.

There was talking to make my head ache, Carson shouting words that did not mean anything to me except for the emotion I heard in his voice. It said Sheppard's danger was great.

"We've got a hemothorax!" I watched as he pushed a strange instrument to Sheppard's chest, catching glimpses while people moved around my dark haired male. "Christ, pnuemothorax – get me a chest tube, we don't have time to wait, the pressure's stopped his heart! Carolyn, get in here and do a needle decompression while I get this blood draining --"

I tried. Father sky knows, I tried, but it had been too much. I had fought for too long. There were people gathered around sky eyes, helping him. I was standing there like a rock, pushed into the cockpit so that I was not an obstacle. Ronon blocked my way. I could not escape from this awful moment of watching Sheppard's soul leave.

The tears came, the salt on my lips.

It had all been for nothing because Sheppard had died in front of me.

My shoulders shook and I pulled free of Ronon, turned to the great ice shield, sat in the chair and wept.

OoO

"Mawani? I'm Kate – a friend of Colonel Sheppard and Rodney McKay."

I ignored the words.

I still sat, my feet on the edge of the chair, my knees pushed against my face, hiding me from their world. I hated their city. What was so great about them, if they could not even save one life?

The noise had waned behind me – had they taken Sheppard's body to prepare it for burial?

I could not bear to look, to see the hurt on sky eyes' face.

I had failed. Sheppard was dead because I had fallen asleep in their strange ship. If I had not slept, I could have stopped him from going out into the storm. He would not have been caught by the wraith, used against us, and had a stupid monster push on his broken bone, taking his life from him when his people were there to take him and sky eyes home.

"Mawani – please, let me help you."

Help?

How can you help the dead?

"My soul wants to leave," I promised, keeping my face hidden. My hair draped over the sides of my face. I could understand the pain that had driven the man to tie a rock to his foot and step into a deep pool. "I should not have lived. It should have been my heart that stilled, not Sheppard's."

Was everyone going to die and turn to dust around me? Would I always be the one that had to live with the pain of being left alone?

Soft hands touched my knees and I could sense the person moving nearer. Her voice was gentle. "Colonel Sheppard isn't dead, Mawani."

Isn't dead?

I lifted my tear-stained face, felt cool air brush against my puffy eyes. "His heart stopped," I said, afraid to believe the impossible. "Once a heart stops, it does not beat again."

She had hair the color of mine, but hers was shorter, touching just below her neck. Her smile was sad. "Not for us." She pulled her hands away and sat in the other chair. I looked around and realized that there were three other people near us – two women and a man. Two of them were dressed in the same clothes of night, with weapons hanging from their chests, like Teyla had worn. The other wore clothes I did not recognize. A coat of white and underclothes the color of the sky when sun was slipping away to rest.

She spoke again, "We have medicine to restart our hearts, and if the doctors treat what stopped it in the first place, it is common for the person to make a full recovery."

Could it be true? Did their magic go so far that it could wake the dead?

I searched her eyes and could find no lie.

She read my face like the sky. "Good, now, this is Doctor Biro, she was here helping Carson with Colonel Sheppard and stayed to make sure you were all right. She would like to take you to the infirmary and make sure you're healthy."

The woman in white smiled, but it did not make me feel warm. I looked away from her, my mouth dry. Kate had said Sheppard was alive. I did not know what this infirmary was, but if Sheppard was there, then -- "I want to see Sheppard." My knees groaned when I tried to move, stiff and painful. "And McKay."

For a moment, I was sure no was on her tongue.

"Please." I remembered Sheppard's words.

"Manners are very important to our people."

Her eyes relented, and she stood. "But only for a moment, then, you'll let us examine you?"

I nodded, my relief replacing everything else in my heart. I would get to see them; see for myself that Sheppard lived and that sky eyes was going to be okay.

Kate's smile reached her eyes. "Good, then it's settled," she said warmly. She stood and led the way past the two people in the uniform of night sky. I followed her, staying close, letting the other woman in white leave last.

As I moved, I was surprised by how much my body hurt. My feet, my knees and arms – I had been thrown against a tree by a night predator, tossed to the ground by the wraith, but it was more than that. Aches lived in my joints and had been growing worse, all since the wraith had fed on me. I walked slowly, like the aged gnarls.

As we left the spaceflyer, I stepped for the first time into their city, and I felt my soul falter again. How many times could it do that, and still hold life? My home had been large enough for me, though not so large for Sheppard and sky eyes. They had stooped at their shoulders to not hit their heads. Now I could see why. The roof was so far above, I grew dizzy trying to look at it.

"Mawani?"

I pulled my eyes from the faraway ceiling. "It is its own world," I said, wonderingly. I could not help it. My worry for Sheppard was still great, my doubt for her words still strong in my heart – but this was a city.

I had lived in a village of stone houses and dirt streets before the wraith came and made it into ruins and dust, but now, I walked inside a metal city, with walls, and a roof so high I could not fathom ever touching it.

There had been stories told of cities that our people had once lived in, cities that filled the woods, but I had never seen them and had thought they were stories told to make the children laugh and wonder.

I had thought the word was not real.

My feet moved and we walked again. She told me that there were many people living in Atlantis, that some of them wanted to meet me. She told me that McKay was with Sheppard, that we would see Ronon and Teyla there as well. I felt bad, then, remembering Teyla's words to me. Her disapproval.

When the first doors opened without any touch, I stared, not sure whether to be frightened or amazed.

"It's okay – they respond to our presence."

It was not okay. I began to feel it would never be okay again.

This place was too strange. It was strong like the wind, it was the cliffs beaten and thinned into walls – it was enough to make my heart beat fast, my skin sweat and my limbs shake. As we walked, there were people everywhere. Not one, or two, or even three and four, but ten and ten more.

I had made a mistake. I should never have come, but I had not had time to consider what it meant. I had been so worried about helping my males, taking them to the place where I had found them, trying to save them from the white haired monsters while they were healing. Then we had found their broken ship and everything had fallen apart. The wraith had had Sheppard in its hands, and I had not thought beyond the moment in front of me.

She paused at another set of doors, turned to me and touched my arm gently. "Wait here for just a moment." Then she and the woman in white were gone, going through the doors. The other two that had followed us stood behind me still.

I turned to them. They were like the nole I had raised from a baby many years ago, its mother killed by a fen. It had followed me everywhere, even after I tried to get it to return to others of its kind. It had dogged my steps. I had told it, "You are useless – go find ground to dig," but in my heart, I had delighted in kneeling by its side, ruffling my hands through its soft, brown fur and feeling the rough tongue run across my skin.

I had loved it for three cycles. Then something inside had stopped working, and my nole friend had died.

One of them smiled slightly at my look, as if to say, "We're all right." But the other, the woman, looked slightly suspicious of me. As if I might do something wrong.

Kate poked her head through the door, waved at me. "Carson's ready for you."

If it had not been for the two people behind me, I might have run the other way, tried to trace my steps back to the only place in this city where I did not feel so lost and overwhelmed. Back to the spaceflyer.

Here, I was the pebble in the pond. The small, twinkling star, in a sky full of more than I could count –

"Mawani?"

I breathed deep, steadied my shaking shoulders. This was silly. Where had my courage gone? The same courage that had let me thrust a knife in a white haired monster's hand, rather than be fed upon. The same courage that had me leave the safety of my home and risk the storms to seek help for sky eyes and Sheppard. The same courage that had thrust an arrow into a wraith, and shot one with a weapon I had never used before?

First, take one step. Then, one more.

A journey of many distances begins with one single small step. And walking to Sheppard's side was not so many steps.

Stepping into Carson's home was harder in many ways than anything else. It was filled with objects that made sounds and had magic lights. People moved everywhere I looked. I felt again like the small pebble, but this time I was being rolled down the riverbed.

So many sounds. So many lights.

I looked around, as nervous as a gnarl, and saw the long, high beds. Saw my two males next to each other. Sky eyes and Sheppard! Relief flooded through my bones, I felt like water freed from a flask. They were alive, they were here.

Both slept, both had tubes going from strange bags of water down to their blankets, disappearing from sight, but I could tell they went to their arms or their hands. Sheppard had one that ran underneath his blanket and came to an area slightly raised off the floor; the bag was half-full of yellow liquid. I was shocked to realize the purpose. His body's waste. They had tubes for everything!

While I had stared, the sounds around me had muffled, almost as if I were back in the storm. Then time hung – nothing else was left around me, except my two males. My feet moved me forward without thought. I did not walk to Sheppard's side, or to sky eyes'; instead, I walked until I stood between them, each to a side of me.

I touched McKay's arm, felt the reassuring warmth of his skin. Then, I rested the back of my hand against his forehead. Dry. He was still warmer than our skin should be, if we were not sick, but he rested without pain. I could see it in the edges of his eyes, and around his mouth. His face was relaxed and unburdened for the first time in many turns of night and day.

I lowered my head to his hand, thankful that his life was saved, his leg would heal. "Thank you, father sky, for this man's life."

When I pulled away, the tears had dampened my cheeks again, but this time, it was not from despair. It was because I was thankful that their people were everything McKay had said.

I gently put his hand back to his bed, turned to Sheppard. I wanted to gather his hand between mine, to feel the pulse of his life, but both hands had their strange tubes running into them. Instead, I ran my thumb along the warm skin. If he were dead, the warmth would be gone. He would be cold and empty, but staring at his face, I knew he was not empty. His soul still simmered behind his closed eyes.

My hands trembled as I ran them across his forehead. My lips had a mind of their own, and wobbled. "You died," I accused softly.

Not even a full moon cycle had passed, and yet these two males had stolen my heart. They had dropped from my sky, filled my home, and warmed my empty soul. The thought of their deaths hurt like nothing else had, since I had lost Lilani. I tried to tell myself they meant nothing. That they were the gnarl and the nole, just another creature that needed my help, but the gnarl and the nole had not held me when I cried, or told me they were sorry for my pain.

They did not look at me with eyes that spoke to my heart, saying I was more than skin and bones.

Their coming was a miracle. Their life still beating in their chest was another.

I swallowed away the thickness in my throat, curled my fingers around just one of Sheppard's, because it was not covered in tubes or wires, and held to him. I had to sniff the water from my nose, and wipe the back of my hand across my wet face, but I did it without caring.

"You and McKay are the night of a thousand miracles," I whispered.

As I stood, bent over Sheppard and holding his finger, I felt the fear begin to ebb away, like the edges of night sky when sun demands his turn. It was soft, gentle, and weariness walked in, because what body can hold so much emotion and not tire from it? I had never felt so many different feelings in such a small amount of time. I had never known so many things and been through so much, all at once.

"Mawani?"

The deafness of my focus disappeared in a rush. The beeping, talking, and movements of many returned to my ears. I knew that voice. With reluctance, I let go of Sheppard, and turned to face their healer. He had saved Sheppard, had eased sky eyes' pain and would make sure he kept his leg.

"You saved them," I said. My face crumpled again – how could it not? "Just like McKay said you would."

He smiled, but it seemed to me a ghost of what he usually wore. "Come with me, love. We need to make sure you're okay."

Maybe he was sad, too? Maybe Sheppard's heart stopping had hurt him, like it had hurt me? Maybe seeing his friends lying so damaged was a heavy weight on his soul? I walked to him, because he asked, and called me love. I had been called many things in my life. Silly, little one, rock and river, but I had never been called such a word that meant everything that was good in life. "Are they your litter mates, too?"

He took my arm, guided me to a bed on the other side of McKay. "Litter mates?" Carson patted the bed.

I sighed. Did none of their people have the word in their mind? "Brothers, or people that know the soul of one another."

"I see." Though the earlier smile had been both light and heavy, now I saw a twinkle of it in his eyes. "And – Rodney and John, they are litter mates?" He took a strange object from his pocket and held it in front of his body, waiting on my answer.

"Of course. It is as easy to see as the sun in the sky."

His amusement was strong now. "Yes, of course it is." Carson's eyes drifted over my head and I turned to see Ronon and Teyla finding chairs and settling to sit with sky eyes and Sheppard. That was good. They should not be alone in their time of healing. A broken body needs the strength of many to encourage it to heal.

They met my eyes. Ronon looked into my soul and nodded, before settling in his chair. Teyla – she smiled warmly, as if to say, "It is all right." I felt a cold spot inside me warm.

She might not have approved of what I had done, but she did not hate me. I was relieved, because this was someone that I knew Sheppard cared for, and she, in turn, cared for him. I would not want to have my actions shame him and make her think poorly of me.

When I looked back to Carson, I found him staring at me. He seemed puzzled, or unsure. Then he frowned and said, "Don't move, I'll be right back."

Don't move?

Before I could ask why, he had left, striding across the room and opening a…wall? When he had it open, it seemed to me that a shelf was built into the wall, so that it could be pushed out of sight when you did not need it. Oh, this city was going to be full of amazing things! Shelves that disappeared, beds like the one I sat on, so soft, and big! My straw beds had never been this soothing, nor long.

When he came back to me, I was proud, because I had not even moved a finger.

"Here, put these on."

Carson handed me white cloth. I stared at it dumbly. "Why would I wear a sheet?"

His forehead bunched and he took part of it away, shook it out, and I realized it was a shirt, in some ways like the black clothes McKay and Sheppard had worn. I darted a glance at them, found Ronon and Teyla watching after I had said my question too loudly. My face burned.

Sheppard and sky eyes were wearing these clothes of white.

"I am not sick, and I will not take my dress off in front of you."

This time the redness flushed across Carson's face. "Oh, no, I… uh, oh bloody…there's a curtain, Mawani, see --" He pointed to the ceiling and while I watched, he pulled the edge away from the wall and it began to unfurl, hiding me from others' sight.

So they would not be able to see me. But I still did not know the reason for changing. "Why should I wear these things?" I had only worn my dresses, my soft tunics of hide and scavenged cloth from the ruins. This one of blue had been my mothers.

"Because I need to examine you, because your dress is practically threadbare and worn to bits –"

Carson was folding his arms now, the strange object still in his hand. Had he forgotten it? I read the stubbornness on his face.

Well, I was not as easily swayed as the newly born trees. I held onto the edge of the bed and said, "I do not wish to wear these clothes. They are…"

What? Why was I being difficult?

The answer was lightning across the summer sky.

My clothes were the end of my world.

That is what it meant. This dress, it was all I had left. I sat on this bed, wearing the only thing I had from my life, and even with that, I had on sky eyes' coat. It hung past my hands and almost to my knees. If I took these things off, put on their clothes of white, I would shed the last of my world.

Carson frowned, before releasing a mouthful of air. He pulled the curtain the rest of the way, then sat on a chair that was different than the others. It was a circle of metal. "Mawani, I know this is…difficult." He searched for his words. "This --" The strange object was handed to me. I took it, feeling the suppleness of the tubes, and the coldness of the metal at the rounded end. "…is a stethoscope. With it I can listen to your heart, and your lungs." I stared at him, then the item. "Lungs?"

"I think you called them air cavities."

Lungs. Air cavities. I looked at it, ran my fingers along it. Then I raised my eyes to Carson. "But, if you lay your ear against my chest you can hear it also."

His smile returned. "Trust me on this, you can hear much more with this instrument."

Trust him.

I trusted McKay and Sheppard. I knew they trusted Carson, and their people. I looked again at this thing called a stethoscope, then the white clothes on my lap. Courage, I told myself.

"I will wear your clothes," I said, resolutely.

"That's a good lass." He beamed, took the instrument, and stepped to the edge of the curtain. "I'll call to see if you're done in a few minutes."

After he was gone, I stared at the place where the hanging cloth met with the other, worried someone would come through while I was naked. Then I realized, the longer I took, the more likely it was to happen. I slipped from the bed, jarring my knees enough to cause a fresh wave of pain. Biting my lip, I shrugged free of McKay's coat, feeling oddly bereft with it gone. A fen without its nest. Then, my dress. I pulled it off, stood naked and shivered while I fought to put on their shirt and pants.

When I had managed it, I was surprised to find the clothes were comfortable. Big, but soft. The legs of these pants were folded at my ankles, but the shirt had cut sleeves so that it only touched my elbow. I turned and climbed back on the bed. Comfortable, but I had been right, it was colder.

"Are you dressed?"

Carson's call came as promised. "Yes, Carson. I am dressed."

The curtain parted and he returned. He brought with him an object full of things – I recognized the white packets and syringes. Carson followed my gaze and set it behind me on the bed, so close I could smell his scent. He smelled like my other males, but there was another smell on him that I could not place. It was tangy, bold, like spice, but subtle on my tongue and in my nose. I smelled again, deeper.

He pulled away, bemused. "What? Do I need a shower?"

Shower? The word was another to find a picture for, but I shook my head at his intent. "You smell good. Like, the best flowers growing in the warmest days…" How did I explain that all I had smelt for too long was gilly, laviola, fevers, and fear?

His smile was warm, but it did not last. "What happened to your world?" he asked with sympathetic eyes. "To your people, and how did you happen to find Rodney and John?"

How to tell my story?

I had given what I knew to my males, not long after I had found them, when the memories had begun to return, along with the terrible ache it caused in my heart. I knew salt gathered in my eyes again. He touched my knee and I looked into his eyes. Their healer had a gentle soul. "The wraith came," I said, my words only shaking a little. "Many cycles ago." I held up my hands and showed him ten and two. "It was my binding day." His eyes of blue faded and Leom stood in front of me. I took his hand from my knee and held on. "I was hidden in a chest – I was my people's hope, my father, he was the sun king and I was his princess moon. They would have died for me." Leom's face melted away and I stared at Carson. "They did die for me, and I became princess of the dust."

His eyes hurt for me. He did not speak and I was glad. Words did not belong with the dead.

I pushed away the pain, again, and vowed to find a way to let it rest forever with the ghosts. "On a day when the snows came, I was walking in my woods. I heard a cry and ran. I found sky eyes and dark haired Sheppard lying in a gnarl's den, a gift from father sky. They were very sick at first, but they began to heal. They warned me about the wraith that had fallen from the sky with them, and told me of their city in the sea, and their healer. Their friends and how you would come for them."

"We tried to come sooner."

He was carrying his own hurt and guilt.

"Why did you not?"

Carson pulled a syringe free from the odd basket. "One of our people, his name is Radek, found information on the planet just as our rescue team was leaving. There are things in your sky that affects our machines. He was working to find a way around that, but then they found mention of a natural pattern to the…"

I remembered sky eyes' words when we had sat in the ship. "Ions?"

His eyes crinkled, pleased with me. I smiled a little in return.

"Yes, ions. We left, but it'd already been a week." He held up five fingers then two. "For another four days we flew high above your world, measuring the ions, waiting. The level began to fall but it was still too high." He pulled an odd cloth of wilted sun from the basket and gave it to me. "This is a type of rubber, I tie it around your arm and it makes your blood push stronger to get around it. I need to take a sample of your blood, to check you for any parasites or diseases, do you understand?"

I nodded, wanting him to continue telling me of how they came to rescue sky eyes and Sheppard. I wanted to think rescue us, but I knew they had come for their people, not me. I was a surprise, yet, they had taken me nonetheless. Would they have argued against it if the wraith had not taken Sheppard?

He tied the band around my arm, just above the elbow. It was tight, then he tapped the thin skin and looked me in my eyes. "Hold still, you'll feel a wee pinch."

I watched, fascinated. He wiped my skin with the smelly cloth then took the needle and began to push it into my arm. It did pinch, and if he had not warned me, I would have pulled away, but I remembered. I did not move.

My blood rushed into the tube. It was amazing, like so much of everything around me.

Then, he was pulling the tube away and pushing a small white ball against my skin. "Hold this for a moment."

"How did you come to find sky eyes?" I asked, holding it like I was told.

He put the tube in the basket and smiled reassuringly. "We got the emergency transmission. Ronon wanted to go right away, but Teyla was worried we'd crash. So," he pulled another item from the basket, "we called Atlantis and sent our latest scans to Radek. He came back and told us his models projected it'd most likely be safe. We have machines to show us how to get to our kind." He grimaced at the memory. "Imagine our surprise to find the life signs scattered. Four, though we didn't know at the time that one was a wraith. As soon as we landed, we went to the nearest life sign, which turned out to be Rodney in the crashed Jumper.

If he hadn't been in such terrible shape, we would've gone after you and Sheppard together, using our machine to guide us – he told us that there was a wraith out there somewhere. With only three unidentified life signs, and all spread out, Teyla and Ronon left to search for you and Sheppard, ready to take down the wraith if they found it first. They knew approximately where to look. I had to stay and help Rodney." A broad smile crinkled his eyes. "If you ever need a laugh, ask me to tell you how Rodney described you to us."

I wanted to smile with him, but my mind had already leapt to another thought, and it was not one that made me feel like smiling. If they had found Sheppard, would they have left? Left me in the cold, where I would have been gutted by a night predator, or lived, only to return to an empty spaceflyer? Would I have lingered for days and nights, waiting for them to return?

No, I would not have lingered. The wraith would have found me, even if the night predator had not.

"But they found me first…"

"Aye," Carson breathed. "While they were gone, the wraith arrived, threatened to feed on Sheppard if we didn't let him in. I had the machine that told me the bloody thing had someone, though I didn't know for sure it was Sheppard until we saw him. After we did, the wraith needed Rodney to fix the ship, me to keep Rodney alive, but he didn't need Sheppard. I can fly the ships, as well as Rodney. That's when you three arrived, just in time."

If his hand had not trembled just then, I would not have known how scary it had been for him.

The monster had used Sheppard to get in the ship and then had been about to take his life. My empty feeling over killing the monster filled with newfound belief that I had acted rightly. It had not cared to go against its vow. It would have killed my Sheppard, and only fortune -- their luck -- had saved Sheppard's life. That we had arrived at the moment we did.

The wraith had not had the same luck, and that was as good of a sign as any from father sky that it had not deserved to live. How could it?

If I had vowed to let it free, and killed it, my soul would have been sullied. No better than the monster. But I had not. I had not said, "I will set you free."

Neither had Ronon.

"It was not me that saved Sheppard," I said.

These words left me tired, again, more drained than I thought a body could be. Reliving memories was hard on the soul, especially when the memories were such as these. They left marks inside that were slow to heal. "Teyla and Ronon saved my life. It was they that led us back in time to save him."

My vision grew blurry.

I fisted my hands, letting go of the white cloth ball, and tried to gain some semblance of control. Had coming to this place reduced me to a child, not able to keep my emotions steady for more than a moment of time? I grew angry. "Finish," I said, and though I meant for it to be strong, and forceful, it was weak, and pleading.

His hand found my leg. The warmth bled through the cloth and I shut my eyes, forcing the pain to just stay away. To leave me alone, for one breath of time. Was it so much to ask for?

"Here, listen." He put the instrument in my ears, held the small circular part against my chest.

Thump-thump. Thump-thump.

I opened my eyes. My heart! The beat…the pulse of life! It was as if my ears were inside my skin and touching my heart.

His head leaned near mine and he spoke, his beautiful voice one I was coming to care for, "I know you've had it hard, love, but you're safe here, and we've got many things to show you. What you went through is over. The colonel and Rodney would not be alive if it weren't for you, and don't think for a moment I'll ever forget that."

I was surprised to see that he was crying.

They were silent tears, but one tried to be heard, hovering at the edge of his eye. I reached for it, to touch his sorrow. My father had said when we hold the pain of others, we learn to let our own go free.

I touched Carson's pain, and I let go of mine.

OoO

This city was like my world.

There was a night and a day.

I still wore the white clothes, but I was in my room, a place Kate had brought me to and said, "You can stay here for as long as you like."

It was big, but not bigger than my home, though the roof was higher. The walls were straight, not curved, and I missed the soft green glow. A window let in the darkness of night, lights came from the wall, rising to fill the room. She had shown me a place to relieve my body of its waste, to bathe, and I had been embarrassed to ask, "How do I use these things?"

After she had shown me, she stood by the door, ready to leave.

"McKay mentioned a place where Teyla's people lived." I brought it up because I did not want to stay where I was not welcome, though I longed to stay here, and learn the ways of healing and the machines Carson used.

She smiled kindly and nodded. "The mainland, yes. Do you wish to go there?"

I lifted my chin. Courage. "No," I admitted. "I wish to stay here, on the city in the sea, and learn the ways of healing."

I could tell I had surprised Kate, but then her smile deepened. "I think Carson would like that."

She left then, telling me if I needed anything, to stop anyone in the hallway and ask for them to call her. She said for a few days, there would be someone outside my door, to be a guide and help me get where I needed to go. In the morning, Carson wished to see me. To go over the results of my exam, though I was not sure what he thought to find. He had given me small things he called pain pills for the aches in my knees and arms, elbows and wrists. It seemed everywhere ached.

Carson had let Kate bring me to my room when he was finished.

At first, he had thought to keep me in the bed I had sat on through his tests, but I had openly pleaded then, to be taken to a place where I could sleep without so many people moving around. I had felt open and exposed in Carson's busy home.

He had given me reasons why he wanted me to stay. I had been through a lot. He was worried about how I was adjusting to the changes.

Now, alone, I turned in a circle, staring at all of it. The walls, the bed, the shelves hidden in the walls, and a thing Kate had called a desk and a lamp. It was beautiful, in a way that was so very different from the cliffs, rivers and trees. I wanted to touch it all, but I did not.

I went to the smaller room, took a shower and watched my waste be whisked away with a touch of my finger. I picked up the object she had called a toothbrush, stared at my face in a thing she called a mirror. I had seen myself before, reflected back from the still waters, but it was nothing like this picture.

This was my image, unblurred, clear. My hair hung around my face, still wet from my shower. I had dried with a towel – cloth so thick and soft I had thought about keeping it around me all night.

I had always used a thin scrap of cloth or gnarl hide to scrub my teeth. Polishing each one took time. Now, I tasted the strong flavor of the paste she told me to use, scrubbed and thought how easy it was to do it this way.

I began to long for the day when this all would be as natural to me as the sun rising in the sky.

The white clothes were on the floor where I had discarded them, and I pulled them on, the smell of my skin making me smile more. Their soap was sweetened like the flowers and sunshine. It smelled of summer days and nights. I sniffed my arm, amazed at how soft it had made my skin.

They had given me a meal to eat before bringing me here, but now my stomach growled at me, angry because I had been too entranced with their forks of metal, and trays made out of a substance they called plastic, to bother eating much.

Is this what my people might have become, had we not been destroyed by the wraith?

I sat, and thought, and knew it would not have been for many, many cycles, and not in the days and nights of my life.

I tried to sleep then. I pulled the blankets up around me, shrugged my body until I was buried and embraced by the softness and warmth. But my mind would not stop. It would not slow down and rest.

I thought about what I had seen walking through the halls to get to my room. The walls with bubbling water glowing green in tubes, and for a moment, I had to touch it, to see if it were the clay from my cliffs, but it was not. It was glass, Kate said. And light.

We had walked past doors where a glinting of sun on water had caught my eye. I had ignored Kate, and our tag-along nole, and gone through those doors, stepped out onto the water. Stepped out into the sky on the ground.

It was the largest bend in the river, over and over again. I could see no trees, no rocks, and for a moment, panic rushed in at me. Then Kate was there, touching my shoulder and telling me, "It's safe. The city has survived for a very long time."

I thought about the person sky eyes had said was their leader – knew that it was similar to the venerated, and also, the role my father as sun king had held. There had been no leader on my tongue, but the venerated had advised. My father and our family had been looked upon as avatars of our people's fortune. We were responsible for the rain, the sun, and the moon and stars.

Their leader, this Elizabeth, had stopped by while Carson was still talking to me. She had a soft smile, thanked me for caring for Rodney and John – for saving them, and I had seen her affection for them shining through. Then, she had left, to stand by their beds with the others, while my two males had kept sleeping, deep, and if it were not for the beeps that Carson had said reported the beats of their heart, I would have grown afraid they were not living.

Was Sheppard still sleeping?

Sky eyes?

Did they know where I was?

Did they care?

Or would I be forgotten now. Useless, because they were back among their people.

I did not believe it of them, and threw the thought to the wind. Still, I could not sleep. My legs were restless, and I tossed the blankets away, stood, and found the feet coverings they called socks in one of the many shelves in the wall, pulling them on and savoring the feel of cloth against my rough skin.

I pushed on the wall where Kate had shown me, watched as the door opened. A man was there, just as she had said would be. He turned and looked at me, curious. "What can I do for you, uh, Mawani?" he asked. He seemed kind in his face and he held out his hand. "Major Lorne, I'm relieving Lieutenant Cadman so she can get some dinner."

"Major Lorne." I tested the name on my tongue, stared blankly at his hand. There were so many customs and unlike my people, they had different words to call each other. I now knew that Sheppard was John, Colonel, and Sheppard. Sky eyes was Mckay, Rodney and also Doctor. So many names for one body.

I took his hand, clasped it for a moment between mine and then let it go. "I would like to see Sheppard and McKay."

His eyebrows raised. "The infirmary?" He considered it then shrugged. "Not sure I'd willingly go there, but, come on."

He gestured with his head to walk with him, and I followed. We went through another of the scary rooms they called a transporter –to be moved from one place to another without taking any steps at all, it was amazing and frightening! Then down a hall, until I recognized the familiar doors. My heart sped up. Were they awake? Would they be happy to see me?

He stepped to the side and nodded, "Go on. I'll stay here."

I hesitated but his smile flashed, encouraging me. I remembered my earlier steps, and followed them, surprised that the lights were dimmed, the room quiet and subdued. It was so different at night than it was during the day. The hanging cloth partially obscured the room – the place where Sheppard and McKay were.

Before I could move closer, I heard their voices, whispered and low.

"Carson said this time he almost didn't get you back."

It sounded like an accusation, like what I had said only slightly differently to Sheppard not long ago. And like my words, sky eyes' held only his turmoil.

"Yeah, well, he did."

My feet stilled. There was something…some emotion hanging in the air, and it told me that this was not for me to hear, not for anyone else. It was like the nights in my home when one of them had soothed the other, and I had pretended to sleep. It was not for me. I should not be here, but I could not get my feet to turn, to walk away…

Sky eyes' laugh was harsh. "Oh, right, so the fact that he pulled off another last minute miracle is supposed to make me feel better?"

"No, the fact that I'm still talking to you is." Sheppard's words were lazy, but affection crept underneath. He coughed, harsh and painful. I watched the shadow of sky eyes struggling to Sheppard's side, hopping awkwardly, before getting close. McKay lifted Sheppard's back and supported his litter mate through his effort to draw breath.

When it passed, McKay eased him to the bed and stood over Sheppard. "We got lucky, Colonel. Do you know how long I'll be on crutches for?"

His words were meant to be grumpy and demanding, but I heard what was inside them. I heard the fear. The pain. Sky eyes did not often speak what was in his heart.

I watched as Sheppard's hand lifted, clasped McKay's wrist. "Long enough to drive me crazy," he rasped.

There might be many that did not hear what sky eyes meant, but Sheppard did. He was sky eyes' litter mate. Truly.

"You know, there's still the matter of you giving me that antibiotic shot --"

"Almost died."

I could hear Sheppard's crooked smile as he asked, "You're not going to use that every time we disagree, are you?"

Sky eyes hopped backwards, his shadowed outline lowering into the chair. "Every. Time," he promised. "There are no statute of limitations for near death experiences and stubborn colonels."

They needed this time.

I turned, my feet finally moving without sound on the floor. Sheppard and McKay would be here tomorrow. I would speak to them then, tell them about the things I had seen, and how amazing their city was. Tell them thank you, because they had given me a life from ruins.

"Mawani --"

I startled, and turned. The curtain had only been partially closed, and I had stepped far enough to the center of the room that sky eyes could see me. I felt my face grow hot. I had not meant to overhear their words.

"I wanted to see if you were well." Did it matter, to explain why, when I had still been here during a moment that had not been meant for my ears?

"No, no," Sheppard said. "It's okay." He waved a hand at me, still full of tubes. "Come here."

Even with Sheppard calling, I almost left, but then I remembered the days and nights of feeding them, bathing their fevered and flushed skin. Remembered sky eyes holding me when I had cried after escaping the wraith, and Sheppard touching my wrinkled skin near my eyes and whispering, "I'm sorry."

They meant more to me than I could say, and I could not walk away.

I smiled wistfully, feeling awkward now. "Your people came."

Sky eyes snorted. "Took them long enough. Still, a rescue is better than no rescue at all."

"I told you they would." Sheppard's bed was raised so that he was leaning upwards. If I had not seen Carson do it earlier, it would have been yet one more thing to wonder about. He waved at a chair near sky eyes. "Sit, you're making my neck hurt."

"You lie," I poked, because I was not so tall that he had to crane his neck to see me. I was shorter than most of their people. Still, I sat, pulling my feet up against my chest.

"So, is Atlantis proving to be all that we said it was?" sky eyes asked, his fingers moving on the chair frame. His question came out like any other…how is your day, how do you feel, is that more white grain weed (with a hidden groan)…but now there were undercurrents, the kind I found in deeper waters. His eyes held a sparkle, a vulnerability, while he waited to hear what I thought of his city.

I rested my chin on my knees and grinned like I was ten cycles old and sharing a secret with Kanai and Leom. "It is the moon in the sky, the stars, and the storms, McKay …it is the wind in the trees and the water rushing down the river."

It was amazing.

He beamed, pointed a hand at Sheppard then to me. "See, Sheppard, she has taste."

Sheppard's mouth twitched. "Of course she does, she saved my life." His eyes of many colors sparkled in the dim light, his soul shining through.

"My life too!" blustered McKay. "In fact, if I remember correctly, she rescued me first."

Sheppard's eyebrow rose and he grinned like an irreverent boy. I read the mischievousness in his face. "Brains before beauty, McKay."

"You just insulted yourself!" declared sky eyes. "You called yourself stupid."

Sheppard's eyes met mine as he kept smiling. "No, Rodney, just admitting that …in some things…you're smarter than I am."

"Well, of course I am. I'm smarter than everyone else on Atlantis, although Radek's probably closest and technically, Carter, when she's here, but note…" He lifted an important finger. "Still not smarter, just close."

This was what I had needed.

What had brought me here tonight. To hear their familiar words, and listen to their voices as they teased one another. This was what had touched my soul in ways that their machines never could.

For all the amazing things in their city, this was what mattered the most.

"Ow, son of a bitch --"

Sheppard's hand cradled his chest and I saw sky eyes shift forward, concern sliding to replace his faked irritation. "What…what'd you do?"

"Nothing," rasped Sheppard. "Just…crap … tried to sit straighter."

"Well, why were you doing that! Carson said to stay still…"

The panicked murmurs of sky eyes alternated with the grouchy, "Quit hovering, McKay, you're worse than Beckett."

They began to speak of things that I did not know about, times before I had known them. Their words had no meaning to me, other than knowing my litter mates had escaped their adventure without damage to their souls. It had been what I had hoped for, what I had begun to believe would never happen at the lowest moments.

When I had struggled in the storm, sure that Sheppard had died in the snow. When I had opened sky eyes' wound and tried to fight the sickness in his leg. When I had thrust the arrow in the wraith and gathered food for them to eat. When I had bathed their fevered bodies and dribbled laviola between their lips. When I had heard McKay's cry and found them lying in the grass, injured and senseless.

They were still the sun and the moon. They were still smiles and irritation, hot words without any fire. They had remained who they had always been, even though they had endured much pain and hardship.

They were whole in their hearts and minds.

It was amazing.

Epilogue – one week later

I stood in the ruins of my people.

This was the resting place of their bones. While I had huddled in fear in the wooden chest, they had burned in this place, with no one but father sky to hear their cries.

Did it matter?

Did not hearing change their deaths? Did it erase the twelve cycles I had lived alone?

Wind blew my pale hair away from my face, and I looked upon the ghosts. I heard their whispers, felt their touch. My pain had been strong, but I had lived. I was not a ghost, and I did not belong to the dust.

They stood behind me, Sheppard pale still, McKay balanced precariously on his wooden sticks. I had told them I would go alone, that it was enough for them to bring me near in the spaceflyer I was coming to know as puddle jumper, but they had surprised me.

"Getting the chance to see just how much damage – it would be scientifically…useful."

"And those storms – might need someone like me, good at navigating…"

McKay had snorted and Sheppard had cuffed him on the back of his head and muttered, "At least I didn't say it was 'scientifically useful' to look at the mass graveyard.'"

I had laughed, full of affection for these two males that had swooped so unexpectedly into my life, and changed its course. My loneliness was not so easily shaken off, but it could at least be set aside, hung on a hook, while I wore a new cloak of joy. Sheppard and sky eyes' people were kind, and generous. I had a place to sleep with a bed so soft it made my bones weep. Carson had said I had a disease called arthritis – though the image I saw in the mirror was not so old, the wraith took life in unpredictable ways, explained Carson. He had seemed truly upset, but I had touched his hand with mine, and told him, "Sore bones are a small thing for what I have gained."

He was beginning to teach me his ways of healing. I learned their words, touched their machines, and I imagined a bird in flight could not feel as light and free as I did then.

No – these ruins did not change anything. But, it let me finally put to rest the ghosts.

I knelt in the snow. The pants I wore now were warm and kept my legs from growing numb. The cloth would grow wet if I stayed like this for long, but I was not going to. Slipping my hands free from the soft mittens they had given me, I dug until I could touch the ashes. A small container was in my pocket, and I pulled it out, unscrewing the top, just as Teyla had shown me. Carefully, I held my fisted hand of ashes over the opening and let the dust trickle into the bottle.

I pushed to my feet, the container clutched tightly in my hand. With my other, I brushed the clinging snow from my legs. This was what I had come for, and now I had to tell them I was leaving, that I would never be back. Ghosts and dust are poor company, I knew.

I told the ruins, "I left the time of the moon and walked like a ghost in the time of maybe." The dust was cold, like the dead, but this place was not empty. "I leave now to walk with the sun." My words caught in my throat, and I struggled to hold my shoulders straight, and finish what was in my heart and on my tongue. "Do not forget me," I said raggedly, then added, "Please," because it felt as right as the sun on my face.

If I tasted salt, what creature could fault me?

I tried to steal the image into my mind, to remember it for always, even as I whispered to them – to my father and mother, my friends, that I had laughed and cried with, and to Leom, whom I had loved with the purity of innocence. "I will never forget you," I promised. "Not even when the sky dims in my eyes."

A rustling sound came from behind and when I looked back, I saw my two males, trying to act as if they were not here and had not witnessed my pain. They had done it before and I did not blame them. This was not theirs to share.

Sheppard's eyes rose to the sky when another gust rattled his weapon against his chest. A storm was moving near, ready to reclaim these ruins. It had only been the magic of their machines that had found it.

"We should," Sheppard thumbed awkwardly towards the waiting ship, "probably go."

"Yes, hopefully before we become permanent fixtures of the second ice age," agreed McKay vehemently, briskly clapping his hands.

I smiled tremulously, and nodded. "Yes, we should."

And I delighted in saying we.

The End.