Chapter Nineteen

Rodney was dreaming, his expression tense, his skin sweaty, his lips moving ever so slightly. Teyla leaned forward from her chair beside Rodney's bed when he stiffened and put out a hand. He raised his voice, murmuring rapidly, "Oh God, I'm not almost dying, am I? Because dying right now would really screw with my plans, especially after I thought I had already survived this hellish ordeal."

Teyla patted him on the arm, helping to lower his hand to the bed, and shook her head. "No, Rodney, you are not dying. You are recovering from your injuries in the infirmary at Atlantis."

She glanced over at the bed Ronon was in when he stirred a little with Rodney's raised voice, but then Ronon settled deeper into sleep again. Teyla was dressed in hospital scrubs, sitting in a chair between Rodney and John's bed, watching over them because she was unable to sleep.

"It was really an amazing feat of engineering," Rodney said quietly, apparently not hearing her, but speaking to someone else in his dream. "It still scares me to think how close that damned suit had come to body-jacking me instead of Sheppard."

Teyla glanced over at John. It had been a day since they were back from their ordeal and John was still unconscious. Oblivious to Teyla and everyone else in the room, Rodney continued, "But then again, if the suit had gotten me instead of John, everybody would have died right off the bat, because we all know I don't have John's kind of stubbornness or stamina."

"Few do," she said softly.

"Ain't that the truth," Rodney murmured.

Teyla was surprised that Rodney had finally responded to her – she thought he might still have been caught up in his dream state. Just to be sure, she sat up a little straighter and said, "But I would not be so sure of your assessment, Rodney. You have a brand of stubbornness all your own."

Rodney frowned and opened his eyes. "I was just talking out loud, wasn't I?"

Teyla smiled gently at him. "Yes, briefly, but do not worry, I will keep the details of your comments between the two of us."

"Damn," Rodney muttered as he rubbed his eyes with one hand. "I hate the weird dreams that come with heavy narcotics. That's what's going on with me, right? I sense the good drugs coursing through my veins."

Teyla chuckled. "Yes, Jennifer has been treating you with the stronger version of her arsenal of medications."

"Thought so." Rodney shuddered and he whispered, "Crap, I thought that damned suit was going to be the death of all of us."

Teyla squeezed Rodney's arm. "The suit is destroyed, Rodney. It is all in the past now. You have nothing to fear."

"It was destroyed?" he said tentatively, his gaze going distant as if caught in elusive remembrance. His voice was firmer when he said, "Say it again. Say the suit was destroyed, because I need to hear it. Repeatedly. All I remember was that everything blew up in a big way."

Teyla nodded. "The magnetic field generator performed as hoped and destroyed the suit. And, yes, there was a large explosion – a few of them, in fact. It is a miracle we all survived with as few injuries as we did."

Rodney closed his eyes, then opened them, searching out Teyla, his expression hesitant and full of doubt. "Even John?"

Teyla smiled. "Yes, even John."

He didn't seem to accept her words. "You aren't just saying that to keep me from freaking out on you, right? He's alive? Because I'll tell you this right now, I will haunt your days if you are just saying that to keep me – "

Rodney stopped himself and shook his head. "Wait, sorry, I forgot who I was talking to. You wouldn't lie to me. What was I thinking? Oh, yeah, narcotics."

She leaned closer to him, seeking to finally reassure him. "John is alive."

Rodney sighed and slumped against his pillow. "Oh, thank God. I thought we all were goners."

"We survived." She pointed to the bed beside her. "You can see for yourself. John is sleeping right here beside you."

Rodney glanced over at John, noticing his presence for the first time. He rubbed a hand over his face in obvious relief, then he glanced over to his other side and saw Ronon and Ashina asleep in their beds. "We were so damned lucky."

He let out a slow sigh of relief, then grimaced and put one hand to his head and the other to his knee. "Ouch. Ouch. Ouch. The knee hurts, but my head is pounding harder than those freaking drums on MXX-924 the night they slipped us the mictrina nectar."

"You have a concussion. And you did fracture your kneecap. But Jennifer says you will make a full recovery."

Rodney noticed the elaborate brace on his leg for the first time. "Oh, great, just great. How the hell am I supposed to get around in this getup?"

He rubbed his leg, then looked around him again. "What's wrong with the others?"

Teyla pointed to Ronon. "He had injuries to his shoulder and elbow, which we already knew about, along with new contusions and abrasions to his back from the blast."

"His back?"

"Yes. It seems he protected you from the flying debris with his body."

Rodney frowned. "I have this distant memory of him being on top of me and I couldn't move. It was quite frightening."

"Yes, as I said, he protected you by covering your body with his own in the explosions."

Rodney shook his head, anxiety flashing in his eyes. "Yes, well, it's not a good thing to do with a person who experiences claustrophobia far too often, but I guess I should be grateful."

Teyla raised an eyebrow. "Yes, you should."

Rodney didn't seem to notice her measured tone, because he kept on speaking as if she hadn't said a word, "Even though he nearly smothered me. Seriously, he's gotta be heavier than any Sasquatch ever imagined."

"Rodney."

"I'm just saying... " He took one look at Teyla's expression and changed subjects, pointing at Ashina across the room. Her father, Jisef, was softly snoring in a chair beside Ashina's bed. Methet was also asleep, but she was on the bed, holding Ashina in her arms.

Rodney's voice was quieter as he said, "Fine. Whatever. What's going on with her?"

"Ashina had surgery last night to correct problems caused by the laser wound. Jennifer says she, too, will make a full recovery. She is merely sleeping."

"Thank goodness," Rodney said with heartfelt sincerity, then he straightened a little and added, "You know, she kind of grows on a person."

"Yes, I agree."

Rodney looked over at John, his gaze heavy with guilt, but he didn't actually ask the question so obvious on his lips. Teyla answered it for him. "John is doing as well as can be expected, given his injuries. He came through the surgery to correct the pneumothorax without incident."

"Pneumothorax? How did – when did – okay, I know how, it was because of that damned suit and his broken rib, but – ah, geez, that really sucks... "

Teyla nodded. "He should be fine, though, he is covered from head to toe with abrasions, bruises and contusions right now. The suit put him through quite an ordeal."

Rodney squinted, as if trying to remember something, and then swallowed hard. "What about when I activated the magnetic field generator? What did that do to him?"

Teyla touched his arm again. "Jennifer does not believe it added a great deal to his injuries."

Rodney closed his eyes for a minute. "What a nightmare," he whispered.

Teyla nodded, quickly glancing to check on the others. It was a habit she still hadn't broken herself of, even though they'd been safely back on Atlantis for over a day, then she noticed Rodney had opened his eyes and was eyeing her closely.

"What about you? How come you're up? It's obviously the middle of the night."

She sighed. "My leg was bothering me. You were dreaming and John – John has barely moved. I thought I would sit with both of you for a while."

Rodney pointed a finger at her. "Good thing Jennifer didn't come in here or else you'd be so busted."

She smiled again, mischievously this time. "Yes, that is true. It is another secret we shall keep between the two of us."

Rodney grunted, then put the palms of both of his hands to press against his eyes. "We came so close to dying in that hellhole and if we did, it would have been because of me."

"Rodney, you saved our lives. The feats you accomplished were truly amazing, so try not to be so hard on yourself."

Rodney pulled his hands away and muttered, "Sheppard nearly died. We all did."

Teyla pointed a finger at Rodney to get his attention. "John did not die. No one did." She paused, studying him closer. "Is there something more going on for you here?"

Rodney sighed and closed his eyes.

"Rodney," she implored.

Rodney shrugged. "Well, okay, maybe – maybe after everything we've been through, after everything I put John through – "

He stopped, words seeming to elude him. Teyla merely rubbed her fingers against his arm. "Rodney, you are so wise in so many ways, but at times you have a hard time understanding the simple things. You do not need to torture yourself with memories of what happened or might have happened – let go of what went wrong and hold onto what went right. We survived. That is all that matters. Anything else is unimportant."

"But – but you don't get it."

"Get what?"

Rodney closed his eyes and sighed. "The whole kill switch thing, the magnetic field generator – all that pain I caused John, the agony he went through because of me – "

Teyla put up her hands. "Rodney, you may have pressed the button, but everything bad that happened was because of the suit and the AI, not you, is that understood? It was not because of you."

Rodney shook his head. "You're letting me off the hook way too easily."

Teyla put her hand on Rodney's shoulder. "No one is letting you off the hook. John would be the first person to say that. What I said was merely the truth."

Rodney looked up at her, guilt still heavy in his expression. She leaned back in her chair. "Perhaps, you need to hear those words coming from John's lips, instead of my own."

Rodney sighed and shook his head. "No, no, it's not that."

He took a deep breath and let it out slowly. "I guess, I guess it's – it's going to take some time for me to work through all of this." He paused, pressing his lips together in frustration. "That damned suit was all I could think about for days on end – no, it was all I could allow myself to think about for days on end. Maybe I'm just having a tough time letting go of it all."

"Understandable," Teyla said simply. "But do not let it haunt you for too long."

She sat back in her seat. "Or else you will have to deal with the likes of Ronon, John, and myself."

Rodney rolled his eyes. "Now, there's a novel approach to therapy – the 'get over it by intimidation' method."

Then, Rodney grunted at his own words. With that, it looked like something that had been tight and twisted inside Rodney finally began to relax, something that had been like that for endless days, but was only now unwinding, and it did Teyla's heart good to see it. But by the time it appeared Rodney was actually letting himself soak in some of those good emotions and fully appreciate them, there was a sudden uncomfortableness in his body. Perhaps, he had thought she'd glimpsed too much of his inner demons.

Ronon, John and Rodney were her best friends and she would die for any one of them, but all three of the men had such difficulty in talking about matters that really mattered to them. They never seemed able to say the right words – or at least never seemed to able to voice the words they would say in a perfect world, and that made her a little sad, but at least she'd felt she had shared a meaningful conversation with Rodney and perhaps helped ease his guilt somewhat.

Rodney chewed on his lip for a moment, then glanced at her, apparently shifting his focus again. He put a hand over his stomach. "I don't suppose it would be possible to get something to eat around here? I mean, I went for days on end with only power bars for sustenance. And trust me, power bars were never designed with that in mind. I may never be able to look at another one without developing intense stomach cramps or stimulating my gag reflex."

Teyla smiled and started to get up. "I will get one of the nurses. I am sure there is something they can bring for you."

"No, I can ring for the nurse, but you better get back into bed before I do or else, as I mentioned before, you'll be so busted."

Her smile broadened as she stood and she murmured, "Thank you for thinking of me before your stomach."

"Yeah, well, if you don't move faster, I may reconsider."

She straightened and steadied herself with her cane. "Rodney."

"I'm just saying I'm starving and you're literally standing in the way of me and food. Come on, move it along. I can't wait all night."

Teyla shook her head and limped to her bed. Once there, she lifted her cane and said sternly, "Press the button for the nurse before I remind you that what I hold in my hand is quite similar to a bantos rod."

Understanding dawned in Rodney's blue eyes and he swallowed hard, his demeanor suddenly shifting from arrogant and demanding to meek. "Oh, yeah, your cane. And you do know how to hurt a person with sticks. You know what? Forget I said anything."

She gingerly sat on her bed. "Rodney, just press the button."

Rodney smiled and did as she ordered, then looked around impatiently for the nurse... if as expecting her to instantly appear. Teyla settled into her bed. It was going to be a long night if he was going to stay in that irritating frame of mind. Regardless, Teyla found herself smiling. It was good to be back home with her friends safe and sound. Her own tension was slowly ebbing away. Once John was up and behaving like himself, all would be right with her world again.

oOoOoOoOo

John awoke to Zelenka and McKay's voices. They were having a tightly whispered argument a short distance away from John's bed. It had been three days since they had been freed and John still felt like he'd gone the distance riding a mutant-sized bucking bull. There wasn't a part of him that didn't ache.

And Radek and Rodney were still arguing – over something to do with the suit.

"No, I don't think so," Rodney said firmly with his hands tightly gripping the handles of his crutches as he stood with his face close to Radek's.

"You don't know," Radek replied, his voice exuding stubbornness.

"I do, too," Rodney said, his chin high in the air. "I was there. You weren't. Really, Radek, sometimes your naivete is astounding."

"It could just have been a compatibility issue."

"No, I don't think so. The mere fact that we never once saw the suit even try to interface with the facility's computer systems says it all."

John opened his eyes. He swore those two could argue about anything and make it seem like monumental, and they still hadn't noticed he was awake yet. Rodney was wearing hospital scrubs, which meant he was still in the infirmary, but he had a set of real crutches now, so that meant he was allowed to be mobile.

Radek looked like usual, his hair ruffled and his glasses were hanging precariously at the end of his nose, which was only a few inches from Rodney's nose. Anyone not from Atlantis might have thought they were about to come to blows, but it was just one of their typical and frequent disagreements.

"Rodney, perhaps you two should take your discussion out of the room," Teyla said softly, "John is sleeping – "

She paused when she glanced over and saw John was already awake. "Apparently, not any longer." She flashed the two scientists a stern glare, then smiled at John. "Hello, John, how are you feeling?"

Rodney smiled and took a step towards John's bed. "It's about time you came to life."

"It was a little hard to stay dead with you two around." John shrugged a little, then regretted it when it set off sparks of pain.

The others moved closer in response to his grimace, making John say through gritted teeth, "I'm fine."

Finally, he let out a slow breath as he relaxed. "I'm just tired. Probably from sleeping too damned much. I'm gonna tell Keller to ease off on the pain meds. I'm tired of being tired."

Teyla's eyebrows went up in sympathy. "I know, but Jennifer says you are coming along much faster than she'd first thought you would."

John frowned. This was much faster? Damn.

He really preferred not to spend time in the infirmary whenever he could avoid it, but the thought of being there longer than he already had left a bad taste in his mouth. He studied Teyla. She didn't look nearly as tired or in quite as much pain as she had when they were stuck together in the facility.

The knot on her forehead was almost gone, but the spectacular blossom of color painting her forehead indicated it would still take some time before the bruising would be completely gone as well. At least, she was smiling. There was something about Teyla's smile that was just contagious.

"How are you doing?" John asked Teyla, already knowing what she'd say in reply.

"I am well. My leg injury is progressing nicely. I hope to be able to move around without my cane soon."

John heard some rustling behind Teyla, then saw Ronon leaning forward from his chair as he dropped his long legs off the next bed over, his arm in a cast and sling. The big guy was still moving around a little too carefully to suit John.

"Hey," John said softly, gesturing with his chin toward Ronon.

"Hey," Ronon said back to him. "I thought you were going to sleep all day like you've done the last three days."

"Sorry," John said and he meant it, knowing full well that his friends had been there camped out at his side while he'd been in and out of consciousness. "At least, the three of you are up and about – "

John paused, his gaze darting around the room.

"Ashina?" he asked, hearing the sudden breathlessness in his voice.

Teyla put a hand on his arm. "Did you forget? She is convalescing as you are. She, too, required some surgery, but she is here on Atlantis in one of our guest suites with her parents as she recovers."

John sighed with relief, then said, "Sorry, still feeling pretty fuzzy. Again, Keller needs to back off on my pain meds."

Teyla tactfully bypassed John's statement and smiled softly as she continued, "You should know Ashina has committed her father to making dolls for each of us to aid in our recovery and I hear they are almost completed. With Rodney's help, she has a list of names for them."

Teyla glanced over at Rodney and her smile grew. "In addition to her doll, Soho, ours will be named Dojo, Mojo, Hoho, and Dodo."

John raised an eyebrow in Rodney's direction. Rodney shrugged. "She was here and I was afraid she'd wake you up, so I just placated her for a few minutes with a discussion of names for the dolls. I tried for names with a little more dignity, but she said she remembered the names I'd said when we were underground and liked them – that they would make a good memory for us."

He waved his fingers in the air. "She's really an intelligent child, despite the whole doll thing. Hell, the next thing you know she'll have us carrying those dolls on our missions. I know you're going to ask, so mine is named Hoho. I tried to talk her out of it, but she thought it suited me. And just keep your snide comments to yourself. Yours is Dodo, by the way. Very appropriate. And that's all I'm gonna say about that. Teyla's is Dojo and Ronon's is Mojo."

John smiled at Rodney's gruffness, knowing how much he really cared about the girl.

Rodney raised his hands in response. "What?"

"Nothing," John said.

"Well, it's true. I had to draw the line, though, when she brought her mother in to sing to us to make us better. I told her I felt just fine, thank you very much. I've got more important things to do, you know, than deal with pint-sized candy-stripers and their maternal healing vocalists."

Teyla's eyes sparkled with amusement before she continued, "Already, Ashina is much stronger. She is such a happy child. She should recover fully."

John let out a long breath and nodded. "That's good... that's very good to hear."

There was a pause in the conversation, then Zelenka said, "I apologize for my part in awakening you, Colonel. I suppose I will continue my discussion with Rodney later and leave you to visit since you are all here. I really didn't mean to upset Rodney enough to disturb you, Colonel. I only thought if we could have discovered – "

Rodney cut him off in an exasperated tone, as if this was the last time he wanted the subject brought up. "I understand the desire to learn as much as we can from Damisk's research, Radek, but there is no research remaining. Don't you get it? The magnetic pulse took care of that. Every piece of equipment, including the computers in that place were fried beyond the point of salvaging."

Radek nodded. "Yes, Rodney, I am very well aware of that, but I was thinking if we could take a closer look at the equipment itself – "

Rodney shook his head and folded his arms in front of his chest. "It's not possible, it's just not possible. I had Lorne take every component of that damned suit and jettison it into space via jumper. It was far too dangerous to experiment with – and quite frankly, it scared the hell out of me."

Radek nodded finally and shrugged. "You were probably right to do that in this instance. Though, it would have been interesting to know for sure why the suit wouldn't access the facility's computers – "

John cleared his throat and held up a hand as he said, "I can answer that one. At least, I can tell you the suit wouldn't allow itself to connect to any of the facility's computers. It was because it thought there might be a trap lying in wait to inactivate its program."

McKay nodded rapidly. "I think that's what Damisk thought, too, that the suit was too afraid Damisk had put some failsafe device in place. Damisk, in fact, did have a program in place, but the suit wouldn't even attempt to interface with the main computer system. That's also why Damisk had the majority of data about the suit on his personal recorder instead of the main computer."

Rodney turned back to Radek. "Frankly, I am relieved to know that all the data from Damisk's computers are gone forever. Some of the things he was working on were pretty alarming. No, that magnetic pulse fried everything and I do mean everything. My tablet computer and scanner are toast. We're just lucky it didn't fry us, too!"

"We were lucky," John said softly, then he straightened and added with pride, "But if I ever had to be stranded inside a quasi-Ancient facility, and trapped inside a super suit with a homicidal artificial intelligence in control, I'd choose you guys to be there to save my butt every time."

He was joking, but McKay grumbled something under his breath about almost screwing everything up. John pointed a finger in Rodney's direction. "McKay, we would have been toast, along with all the electronics and computers, if it hadn't been for what you did for us, so just let go of it."

Suddenly, Rodney stiffened as if reacting to what John had just said, though for the life of him John couldn't figure out what specifically had caused such a reaction. Rodney became a little self-conscious and nodded a couple of times. "Right. Right. Speaking of what happened, I just want to say – I mean, it's just that – "

Rodney looked guilty as hell and it almost hurt John to see Rodney in such distress, but Rodney continued on, "So, well, Teyla has been expounding on the virtues of letting go of the negative, but you know how well I do at that... "

John just said, "Yeah, I know all too much about that."

"Just shut up for once and let me – " Rodney said, then paused, taking in a deep breath, trying to rein in his obvious emotions.

John paused, eyeing Rodney closely. "McKay, you're acting stranger than normal. What's going on?"

John silently cursed under his breath with Rodney's reaction. John's words hadn't come out the way he'd mean for them too. His thoughts were sluggish, too. The damned pain meds weren't helping things at all. He could see Rodney was struggling to say something and he'd just made it more difficult.

Rodney shot an exasperated glance at Teyla and something passed between the two of them. Teyla nodded slightly, making Rodney close his eyes, as if counting to ten. When he opened them, he glared at John. "You know, Mr. Sensitivity, there might have been something I wanted to say to you."

"I'm sorry. I'm still pretty fuzzy and I can't seem to keep my mouth shut when it should be, so, well, go ahead and say it then."

Rodney shot daggers in John's direction. "Yes, well, okay... " He took a deep breath and tapped the fingers of one hand on his leg. "Well, uh, okay, okay – " His gaze darted around the group of people briefly. He sighed. "Hmm, the moment seems to have passed, and it's all your fault."

John shook his head. "My fault? How did you come up with that?"

Ronon grunted. "It's just McKay being McKay. You should be used to it by now."

John smacked his lips together. "Don't think that will ever happen. Come on, Rodney, say what you wanted to say."

Rodney glared at John again for a long moment, then his expression softened and he said, "Maybe later."

He then glanced at Teyla and Ronon, and seemed to change channels. He pointed at them and said, "Okay, Colonel Smart Mouth, you're always expounding on how I don't know how to be civil with people. Well, you want me to be civil? Okay, I'll give you civil. I want to congratulate Teyla and Ronon on improving their computer skills. It would have been difficult, if not impossible, to uncover as much information as I did without their assistance."

"Why, thank you, Rodney," Teyla said.

Ronon shrugged. "It was a hell of a lot more fun destroying that computer console with my blaster at the end than any of the other stuff you made me do on the computer."

Rodney sighed. "You can lead a horse to water, but you can't make him drink."

Radek shook his head. "What would a horse drinking water have anything to do with this conversation? I thought you were talking about computer skills? By the way, you have never once complimented me on my computer accomplishments, Rodney. Why is that?" He said it tongue-in-cheek, but John wondered how much of it was a sincere question.

Rodney looked at Radek, as if he were about to strangle him. "I've been to hell and back – and you want a pat on the back? Really, Radek."

"So much for civil," Ronon muttered.

Rodney sputtered for a moment, then pointed at Ronon. "And you – you weren't almost squished like a bug by this big behemoth like I was. It's a wonder I'm still alive."

Ronon shook his head. "I was saving your life."

"Like when you dropped me? I'm sorry, but that story is getting old. Next time, don't save me. I think I'll have less injuries that way, thank you very much – and just for your information, you were squishing the life out of me, King Kong. You know, I think a little concern for me and my condition is something desperately warranted here."

Before anyone could say anything, Jennifer came into the room with her medical scanner in hand.

"Hello, everyone," she said, pausing as she glanced at her watch. "Okay, Rodney, I'd say you've been up long enough. Time for some rest. I want to check your blood pressure again in a few minutes to see if it's finally staying back down in the normal range."

Rodney gestured with a hand toward Jennifer. "Just my point. Thank you, Jennifer, for your concern."

John grunted. "You might want to wait more than a few minutes, Doc. He's been arguing with Radek and you know what that always does to his blood pressure."

Jennifer rolled her eyes. "Very true. You two need some serious couples counseling."

"Forget what I just said," Rodney muttered.

Both Radek and Rodney still appeared to be offended by Jennifer's comment, but Jennifer just ignored them. She looked at John instead, as if he had suddenly become her prized lab rat.

She came closer to the bed with her medical scanner in hand. "In the meanwhile, I can share the results of the latest scan we did on your spinal cord. There's no sign remaining at all that would indicate it had ever been attached to a neural interface."

John smiled broadly. "That's great news."

Jennifer looked at her scanner again. "Yes, there's no permanent damage that I can find and your injuries are healing up nicely."

She set down her medical scanner on the bedside tray and took her stethoscope around the back of her neck, then the round end put it up to John's chest. It was ice cold, as usual. That alone was enough to awake him fully. "Oops, sorry, about that, Colonel. Let's have a listen to your lungs."

After a few moments, she said, "The pneumothorax seems to be completely resolved. All in all, you are doing quite well, Colonel."

As she stepped back, she reached for her scanner again and said, "Hmm, I guess that suit wasn't so invincible after all."

"What?" John said, glancing up at her.

Jennifer shrugged. "The suit. I just said it wasn't so invincible after all. That was its codename, right?"

Everyone became strangely subdued, as if memories from the facility were revisiting each one of them. "It wasn't so invincible in the end," she said as she draped her stethoscope back around her neck.

Then, Teyla nodded and said, "I agree, Jennifer. I believe Damisk chose an inappropriate name for the suit. It was not as invincible as he had planned. When I think of invincible, I think of what I witnessed while trapped in the facility – namely, John's indomitable will, Rodney's unwavering resolve, and Ronon's steadfast determination. Even little Ashina with all of her vulnerability had a strength the AI could have never dominated."

The others looked at her as she paused, then said, "Intelligence may be something that can be reproduced in the way of an artificial intelligence, but there can be no replacement for the human spirit and its ability to overcome all odds. Without that in place, everything else fails."

"Amen to that," John said softly.

Jennifer nodded thoughtfully, then began to gesture as if ushering everyone out of the room. "Well said. Okay, I need to have my patients resting. Teyla, Ronon, that includes the two of you. Back to your quarters. Both of you have be here far too long. Come on, time to clear out all guests."

Radek nodded and left with Ronon trailing behind him.

"Sweet dreams to both of you," Teyla said as she patted John on the leg, then she left the room.

Jennifer looked at Rodney. "I want to order another scan for your knee, Rodney, along with some other tests for John. I will be back in a couple of minutes and we'll get your blood pressure while we're at it," she said, then left the room.

John settled back into his pillow, ready for another nap, no matter how badly he wanted to avoid sleep again. He heard Rodney muttering. When he glanced over, he saw Rodney was still sitting on the edge of the bed, instead of climbing on top of it.

Rodney grunted as he reached over and fluffed his pillow with dramatic fervor.

John looked at him. "What?"

"Teyla said sweet dreams. Yeah, right. I'll have nightmares for weeks after what we've been through. I doubt I'll ever sleep again. Permanent insomnia is what I'll have."

John shook his head. "Come on, Rodney, relax a little. You did good on this mission. The fact the rest of us are here with you now verifies that. Don't be so hard on yourself. Pretend you're on vacation."

"Pfft, vacation. You're a funny guy." Rodney got back into bed with a great deal of effort and cursing. He was out of breath when he finally said, "Though, a little R&R wouldn't be such a bad thing."

"Yeah," John agreed. "There you go. Now, take it easy."

Rodney glanced over at him before he looked down and began fiddling with the fibers of his blanket, as if they'd suddenly become very interesting. "I just want to say I'm sorry for everything I put you through."

"You don't have to apologize, Rodney. I'm a big boy. Bad things happen. And it wasn't your fault. None of it."

Rodney muttered something under his breath in disagreement, but he let the discussion drop. At least, for the moment. When John looked at him more closely, he thought Rodney did seem a little more at ease and that helped John in turn to relax a little more.

Rodney cuddled up to his pillow as he got more comfortable, looking like he was about to drop off to sleep. John shook his head. Rodney could fall asleep faster than anyone he knew. So much for worrying about nightmares or permanent insomnia.

"I'd still like some Shiska stew," Rodney murmured, sounding like he already had one foot in dreamland.

"I know, buddy," John said softly.

A moment later, Rodney was snoring. John smiled as he began to make plans on how to Ronon could smuggle some Shiska stew into Atlantis – after all, Rodney had saved all of their lives. He was due some Shiska stew for that and more. Then again, so were all of them.

John closed his eyes and felt himself drifting off to sleep, too.

oOoOoOoOo

The End

And that's the end to a story I started almost three years ago! There's a lot to be said for patience and perseverance. And it might not have been finished in this much better, revised version, if it hadn't been for the kind words of encouragement from you guys to keep me working on it. After all, sga fans deserve the best! Thanks again for all of your patience! Until next time!