***** AN: This is the unedited version of the last round fic. (Ch. 12) All fics had word limits and I had to do a lot of cutting with them all to get them to fit after I'd written them. But this one gave me fits! The limit was 1,100 words. I think I cut 500. So here's that uncut version....
Ketras did not understand.
"You will not?" He frowned. He must have heard wrong. "You will not help us?"
The visitors had participated in the pre-harvest festival. They drank the dalhad wine and shared bread and pledged assistance. Now they were turning away?
"I am sorry, Elder, but we did not. . . understand. Our ways differ from yours."
Ketras stood suddenly, his chair scraping back across the floor. He leaned forward, palms flat against the top of the negotiation table. "There are not 'your ways' and 'our ways,' Visitor Emmagan. There is only the right way."
The four visitors stood as well, more slowly, more deliberately than Ketras had. Three drew subtly closer to one. Visitor Emmagan may have offered an apology, but none looked sorry.
"Listen," Visitor Sheppard said, his tone reasonable but eyes snapping with anger, "we agreed to repair your harvest machine in exchange for a look at the energy readings in your temple. And we'll do that. Or we can forget the trade altogether if you want. But we won't — "
Ketras' guards had them secured before Visitor Sheppard finished his sentence.
--
Ketras thought his prayers had been answered when the visitors walked through the ring. The village had regular traders, yes, but none with the Atlanteans' technology. The harvest machine sat in a place of honor in the village center, a reminder of a better past and a hope for a better future. When the four visitors appeared, Ketras believed that future had come.
"Sure, we can get it running for you," Visitor Sheppard had said during talk of trade.
"We?" Visitor McKay huffed.
"You," Visitor Sheppard amended. Then he turned to Ketras and said, "McKay fixes everything."
Ketras found it hard to speak for a moment. "Everything?"
Visitor Sheppard grinned. "You name it.
Not just the harvest machine. The old water system, the damaged energy generators, the broken medical machines. Everything.
Visitor Sheppard had offered Visitor McKay to fix everything.
But in the morning, Visitor McKay balked at staying.
It was a breach of trade Ketras would not stand for. Could not. His village still feared the Wraith, but it needed that technology. They could not stand another famine like the one that had taken so many lives last season. They could not deal with another sickness without cure.
They needed Visitor McKay.
--
Ketras was not cruel. He neither beat the visitors nor threatened to take their lives, though some in the village thought he should have. He separated them instead, securing the three in one dwelling and McKay in a second dwelling far across the square.
"No, no, no. You only want me, right? So let them go," McKay said to Ketras, twisting around to look back at his companions with panicked eyes as the guards hauled him away and toward his dwelling. "They can't fix anything! They'll just. . . just. . . take up space."
Ketras spat at the ground, the bitter taste of anger too much. "I am no fool. Your friends would return for you and destroy the village in retribution. Your companions will remain until you agree on your own to honor the trade, McKay."
McKay suddenly stopped and the guards pushed him forward. "Wait, wait, you dropped the 'Visitor' thing. Why did you — " McKay snapped his jaws shut, as if afraid the answer would escape his own lips.
"You are no longer a visitor," Ketras told him. "Whether you decide now or later, you are here to stay."
And Ketras would treat him that way. An able adult who did not work, did not eat. McKay would change his mind about the repairs after a couple of days without food.
--
It did not take days. After missing just the mid-day and evening meals, Ketras learned McKay wanted to talk.
Ketras found him pacing the length of the dwelling. He was sweating, a fine sheen across a face that looked pale, and Ketras wondered how long he'd been moving.
"I know you don't want to feed me," McKay said as soon as he entered. "I can understand that. Why waste food on a prisoner, right? But the thing is, I get sick when I don't eat. Hypoglycemia. I've already got the headache and nausea and I'll only get sicker and eventually I'll — " He stumbled, catching himself with a hand on the wall. He straightened and turned around, facing Ketras. "I need to eat."
Ketras was unconvinced and unmoved. "Will you stay and help us?"
McKay lifted his chin. "I'll fix the harvest machine. We agreed and I. . . but stay? I can't. My people need me."
"My village needs you," Ketras told him.
"I can't."
Ketras left him to pace.
--
The moon was high when a guard woke him. "McKay complains of sickness, Elder."
Ketras was up and pulling a tunic over his sleep clothes before sleep truly cleared from his mind. He paused. "Complains of sickness or is sick?"
The guard looked uncertain. "He has not moved in many hours."
"It's night," Ketras reasoned. "He is tired."
"His hands shake."
"Fear."
"His words do not always make sense."
"That is not new!" Ketras pulled off the tunic and returned to bed. "Do not wake me with his complaints again."
--
In the morning, McKay told his guards he would stay.
Ketras strode to the dwelling, pleased. In just one day he had settled the matter absent violence, absent injury. And with McKay's help, his village would have a future. He entered the dwelling with a feeling of pride.
Then he saw McKay.
He was sitting hunched on the floor with his back against the bed and his head dropped forward. Trembling. He looked up slowly when Ketras entered, as if it took effort to raise his head.
"I'll w'rk," he slurred. "Let the others. . . the others. . . go."
Ketras signaled the guard. "Get his leader," he instructed. "Get him now."
--
McKay would not to eat.
Not the sweet nut bread Ketras carried from his interrupted morning meal. Not the stew Ketras ordered brought. McKay mumbled about freeing his team and turned his head away, clouded gaze on the floor.
Ketras was more relieved to see Sheppard than he would admit.
"McKay?" Sheppard crossed the room in two quick steps, dropping into a crouch in front of him. He pressed his fingers to the inside of McKay's wrist, then turned his face gently toward him. "Jesus, Rodney. When's the last time you ate?"
"Last morning," Ketras told him. "He would not work and — "
Sheppard launched to his feet with such ferocity that Ketras automatically took a step back. The guards started forward, but Ketras waved them off.
"He needs to eat." Sheppard clenched his fists at his sides.
"I tried." Ketras gestured to a bowl on the table. "He refused."
"Right," Sheppard said with a sharp edge of mistrust. He snatched up the bowl and crouched in front of McKay again. He stirred the stew with the spoon and the smell of warm vegetables wafted through the room. "Hey, buddy. Food."
McKay's head snapped up, eyes unfocused. He scrambled back and up onto the bed, pressing his back against the wall. "No, no, no."
Sheppard froze. "Rodney?"
"Won't let my team go if I eat."
Ketras shook his head emphatically. "That is untrue. He is confused."
Sheppard moved slowly toward McKay. "C'mon, buddy. You need to eat."
"No!" With a quick motion, McKay knocked the bowl out of Sheppard's hand. "Not 'til they're safe."
"Dammit," Sheppard said. "Never thought I'd say this, but so help me, Rodney, if you don't eat I'll get Ronon to hold you down and I'll force-feed you myself."
McKay only pressed harder against the wall.
"Get his pack," Sheppard said. "I need — "
McKay suddenly seized, shaking the bed so hard it skittered along the floor. It lasted barely a few seconds, just long enough for Sheppard to reach him. Then he fell still.
Completely still.
Ketras' breath caught in his chest. "He is — "
"Unconscious," Sheppard growled, scooping McKay up and over his shoulder. "But unless you want him to die here. . . ."
"Go. Go!"
"Ronon and Teyla?"
Ketras' eyes flicked to one of the guards and the man ran off. "Being released now."
Carrying McKay, Sheppard charged toward the ring. Ketras kept up with him for the first steps. "I did not know. I am sorry," he said, begging forgiveness. He would never take a life. "I just needed help for my people."
Sheppard's stride didn't break.
Then they were gone.
--
The Atlanteans would want retribution. They would return with weapons and soldiers to avenge McKay's death. Or his near-death if, by some grace of the Ancestors, he survived.
Ketras sent everyone to seek refuge in the caves. McKay's sickness was his fault. When the Atlanteans arrived, they would find him alone. If they wanted vengeance, they could have it with his blood.
Ketras waited two days before the ring lit to life, producing four people he knew. Then stranger after stranger carrying boxes and tools and equipment.
The Atlanteans had returned.
With help.