Vain_Glorious

 

 

Ronon Dex’s entire squad ends up in the hospital for nearly a week after their surprise battle with the Wraith on what was supposed to be a simple trade mission. The only person who really needs to stay there that long is the Runner, who took a beating the scrawny little guy probably shouldn’t have survived. Satedans are made of sturdier stuff, and also none of them started a fistfight with a Wraith. Sheppard stays in the hospital the longest.

Now, normally, Ronon has a foolproof plan for getting released before the doctors say he can go. He just points out to some low-level orderly or nursing assistant that his name is the same as the doctor who’s treating him, so of course he can leave. The trick is to do this when Melena’s not actually on-call, so no one can ask her. And when she gets home and is irritated –  although at this point no longer surprised – to find him sacked out in their bed instead of a hospital gurney, she’s not going to send him back unless he’s bleeding to death. She wants him home just as much as he wants to not be in the hospital any more, and the part where she threatens to have him chained to his gurney next time isn’t very sincere. Although, now he knows she’s not totally joking because that’s not a far cry from what she did to John Sheppard to keep him in his gurney.

Except that Sheppard deserves it because he ruins Ronon’s escape route this time and keeps them both in the stupid, boring, smelly hospital for way longer than necessary.

Sheppard doesn’t like hospitals any more than Ronon does. Not for the same reasons, though. Ronon just gets bored and restless immediately and doesn’t see the point of staying in one when he can go home and lie around in pain just as effectively in his own bed. With his wife, the doctor, who will probably keep him from dying if he pops a particularly important stitch holding his guts together.

Ronon hazards a guess that the reason Sheppard hates the hospital so much is all the time he spent here when he first arrived on Sateda. It makes sense and Sheppard probably doesn’t like thinking about back then.

That’s Ronon’s opinion and not what Sheppard actually has to say.

“Even your hospitals are like bondage dungeons,” the Runner snaps at him, trying futilely to get the cardiac monitor off of his chest. “Seriously.” After one night and one day, he’s expressed this one opinion about fourteen times without explaining how it’s different from a typical dungeon.

Across the room in his own gurney, not actually tied to anything except an IV full of happy juice, Ronon just ignores him. The more Sheppard fights, the more the med staff is going to make him miserable. That’s gotta be true about every culture’s doctors.

Ronon opens his mouth to ask, but pauses and then doesn’t. Sheppard will share if and when he wants to.

“Hey, Nurse Ratchet,” Sheppard calls to someone passing the door in the hallway. A junior nurse walks in, but Ronon knows that isn’t her name.

She peers at Sheppard, clearly recognizing the handiwork of her colleagues designed to keep him in bed and in place, and raises an eyebrow.

“Please?” is all Sheppard says, wiggling as much as he can. When she doesn’t react, he tries another tactic. “Look,” he begins. “I live with a doctor. Melena Dex. She said I could go home.”

Ronon hears that lie and sits up so sharply his abused stomach muscles start screaming in pain.

Unfortunately, it’s too late, because the junior nurse is already using the staff transceiver on her belt to call Melena and Sheppard has just ruined everything.

“Idiot,” Ronon hisses at Sheppard, who just looks at him innocently.

“What?” Sheppard demands. Ronon shakes his head. If the guy weren’t being held together with sutures and stubbornness, he’d whack him one.

Melena arrives minutes later and she immediately looks amused.

“This one yours?” the junior nurse asks.

Melena nods. “Yeah,” she says. “He’s mine. Hi, John.”

“Yo,” Sheppard mutters, chin up petulantly as he leans back against his pillow.

“He’s not going anywhere,” Melena tells the junior nurse, who nods knowingly. “Oh,” Melena continues, jerking a thumb towards Ronon’s gurney, as half of her mouth curls upwards. “That one’s mine, too. And he’s not going anywhere, either.”

Ronon can’t control the scowl that crosses his face.

“I’ll make sure the ward staff know,” the junior nurse promises.

“Thanks,” says Melena. She follows the woman out of their room without another word to either man, eyes sparkling in way that means she finds this hilarious.

Ronon waits until he can no longer hear their footsteps clicking against the floor. Then, not caring how much it makes his back and shoulder throb, Ronon leans forward, jerks his pillow out from behind his head, and hurls it hard at Sheppard. His aim is true and it lands solidly across Sheppard’s neck and chest. 

For a second, Sheppard is silent. Then, he actually moans and it sounds like genuine pain. “Owww.”

“Shut up,” Ronon says, slouching back down on the bed.

~

Ronon still gets out of the hospital sooner than Sheppard. He doesn’t even have to use husbandly persuasion, because Kell wants him at a debriefing with the chieftain on how a peaceful trade mission ended in a full blown confrontation with the Wraith and unauthorized detonation of an isotopic pulse cannon missile.

Abruptly, staying in the stupid hospital is almost appealing. Except it’s still boring and pointless and now he doesn’t have a pillow, because Sheppard won’t give his back.

The debriefing is just as dumb as Ronon expects. Kell clearly doesn’t want to be there any more than Ronon does. The great old bearded chieftain and his counselors ask pointless questions and Ronon answers them, more or less honestly. The rest of his squad, minus Sheppard, sits around the table silently and looks bored and a little uncomfortable.

Ronon doesn’t think it’s hard to understand: it became a combat mission because the Wraith showed up. Fortunately, no one asks him why the Wraith were there. The word “Wraith-bringer” doesn’t come up.

Also, no one will explain to him why they brought an isotopic pulse cannon missile along on the mission if they’re not allowed to use it without permission. They were going to give it to villagers who more than likely would have tied a goat to it rather than actually figure out how to use it. Ara blew a Hive out of the sky and Ronon doesn’t see how that could be a bad thing. He half-wonders if Ara just took it from the armory because she wanted to, but he’s not going to accuse her of that in front of the chieftain.

Eventually, Ronon figures out that the chieftain is concerned that somehow, someone on that planet is going to go tell the Wraith that the people with the weapons capable of taking out Hive ships are Satedans.

“We destroyed the Hive,” he says, very clearly. “There’s no one to tell.”

The villagers were also a little distracted, but he’s not going to mention that. Or else Kell is going to want to know what in the hell was going to make them focus on anything but five Satedan soldiers battling the Wraith.

“The Runner you picked up last year,” the chieftain says, finally. “He knows about the weapon.”

Ronon isn’t sure Sheppard does, actually. “He was severely injured before we used it,” he says, which is true. “And he’s not a security risk.”

“This man came from a planet that used Ancestor technology,” Kell announces. “It’s possible he is aware of many weapons successful against the Wraith.”

“His world was destroyed,” Ronon points out. Sheppard hasn’t said more than three words about where he came from, but it’s obvious that whatever weapons they had weren’t successful.

“Has he spoken of Ancestor technology?” the chieftain asks, and he looks interested.

“No.”

The chieftain leans back in his chair, knitting his fingers on the tabletop.

“Perhaps he should be asked.”

~

Kell visits Sheppard in the hospital shortly after that. It takes a week or so because the doctors say Sheppard’s not up to talking. Ronon didn’t even tell Melena to say that; she must have guessed. Kell goes alone and Ronon finds himself irrationally worried about the meeting. It’s doubtful that Sheppard will have any information for them. And he also knows better than to mention anything that happened on this last mission. The conversation won’t be productive and that could really piss Kell off.

But Kell doesn’t look particularly upset when he emerges from Sheppard’s room. He doesn’t look happy, though, either.

Ronon glances at him curiously from his seat in the hallway and Kell stops for a second.

“He says no Ancestor technology survived,” Kell tells him.

Ronon nods, not surprised. He remembers, vaguely, the few images he got to see of Sheppard’s world.

“But he does have knowledge,” Kell continues, starting to walk again. “It may help us.”

Ronon goes in to check on Sheppard after that. The patient looks much less green, though still hopelessly tangled in various pieces of medical equipment.

“Hey,” Ronon says, arriving at Sheppard’s bedside.

“Hey,” Sheppard replies. He doesn’t look upset by whatever Kell asked him.

“How’d it go?” Ronon asks.

Sheppard shrugs, a slight movement that still looks stiff and painful. “I’m not a scientist,” he says, eyes on the tufts of his blanket. “I don’t know shit about what he wants to know.”

Ronon nods, a little relieved that Kell accepted that response. The taskmaster’s been interested in the topic since Sheppard arrived. “Yeah.”

Sheppard look up, eyes hopeful. “Can I go home now?”

Melena has some kind of doctor meeting all day, so Ronon nods. “Yeah,” he says, and starts undoing the nearest straps connecting Sheppard to the machines.

~

Everyone’s out of the hospital, but Ronon’s entire unit is still banged up enough that they’re not heading out into the field any time soon. So, Kell schedules about forty thousand meetings with the other Master Specialists to go over Wraith intel. Ronon almost asks Sheppard if he can come up with another planet that thinks he’s a Wraith-bringer so they can go there, but he eventually decides that Sheppard won’t think that question is even a little bit funny.

Sheppard’s under Melena’s orders to stay home and recover. She won’t even let him out to do practice flights at the training barracks. Ronon’s not sure who’s more bored. The intel meetings are long and repetitive, but Sheppard’s locked up in the house with Melena in her meanest doctor mode.

One day, while Melena’s saying goodbye to Ronon in the front doorway, Sheppard tries to sneak out the back, stupid horned flight helmet in hand. 

“Get back here, John!” Melena hollers, her mouth so close to Ronon’s ear that he jerks back and rubs it.

Sheppard skulks back into the house. He walks into the front room, puts his helmet on a side table, and crosses his arms.

“I’m better,” he tells them, tightly. “I’m better and I’m going out of my mind.”

Ronon feels for the guy. Melena’s never been this much of a hardass to Ronon, but then again Ronon’s never come home in that condition before. He makes a note not to.

Melena only tilts her head. She takes one step toward Sheppard, who’s trying to stare her down. Ronon watches, a little wary. His wife stretches out one slender finger and pokes it, lightly, into Sheppard’s stomach below his crossed arms.

Sheppard instantly turns white and actually doubles over in pain. He gasps twice and Ronon almost thinks he’s going to pass out. After a minute, with difficulty, Sheppard straightens up and drops his arms from their protective grasp around his middle.  He turns around without a word, picks up his helmet, and stomps off towards his bedroom.

~

The rest of the squad’s occupied with the usual stand down routine, like weapons recertification and physical fitness tests. They’re not going to be allowed back in the field until Sheppard can pass his or at least cheat well enough to pass, and that looks a while off. The squad is taking turns dropping by Ronon’s place while Melena’s at work. Partly because they’re Sheppard’s friends, and partly to make sure he’s actually staying there. Ronon has second thoughts about whether hanging out with Rakai is the best way for Sheppard to heal, but figures if nothing else, parrying threats will keep Sheppard entertained.

It’s almost like the first few months Sheppard was in Ronon and Melena’s home. Except Sheppard's a totally different man. For one, he likes them now, even with the way Melena’s treating him. There’s no trace of the wild and frantic emaciated guy he was back then. The stubborn and the argumentative as hell parts of his personality are still firmly in place, though they’re mostly directed at Melena now rather than Ronon. But there’s also calmness and a centeredness that definitely wasn’t there before.

The Runner has mastered pretty much every Satedan card game in the weeks since he’s come home from the hospital. He’s also tried to teach them all some games from his home world, but it’s hard because the cards don’t match up exactly. He’s numbered and drawn silly pictures on the Satedan ones to try to make them work, but it doesn’t really. Most of Sheppard’s games revolve around lying and/or randomly receiving the “right” cards. Ronon doesn’t understand why that’s fun.

“It’s fun because I win all your money,” Sheppard says. They’re using dried salted sticks of Oruva meat as money, because Sheppard really likes it. In reality, Sheppard has given every single one of his paychecks to Melena – just like Ronon does –  from the day Kell officially made him part of the Satedan military. It isn’t necessary and it’s about ten times what’d they get if they tried to rent his room out, but Sheppard has always just shrugged and said he has nothing to do with it.

Ronon grunts while Sheppard sweeps up the center pile of Oruva sticks and sticks one happily into his mouth.

“Or,” Sheppard says, looking at Ronon’s irritated expression. “I could take all your money and then punch you in the face, and we could call it Satedan Poker.”

“Okay,” says Hemi, and Ronon can see him making a fist under the table.

“No,” Melena says sharply from across the room, where she can’t see Hemi’s hands. She doesn’t even have to look up from her book.

~

One day Ronon comes home from another endless Intel meeting and finds Sheppard reading a thin book in the living room. This is strange for one reason: the man can’t read Satedan.

Sheppard puts down the book abruptly when Ronon walks in and looks like he wants to shove it under a pillow or something.

“Hey,” Sheppard says.

Ronon glances at the thin pile of magazines lying on the cushion next to Sheppard. They’re a bunch of children’s reading exercises. Ara’s brother is a teacher and she’s been threatening since the beginning to make Sheppard sit down with his class of six-year-olds and learn how to read and write.

“Hey,” is all Ronon says.

“Ara came by,” Sheppard says, tipping his head at the papers. “If you people had television, I wouldn’t have to do this.”

Sheppard is awfully defensive about the topic. Ronon’s guess is that his world didn’t allow soldiers to read. It’s not wholly uncommon across Pegasus, since soldiers that have access to information from sources other than their taskmasters sometimes get contrary ideas in their heads. They also can’t write debriefing reports, which Ronon almost considers a decent tradeoff. That’s one thing Sheppard can’t and doesn’t do, too.

“Or video games,” Sheppard continues. “I don’t know how you can invent nuclear weapons but not Pong.”

Sheppard calls the isotopic pulse cannon missile a ‘nuclear weapon or close enough,’ and Ronon has encouraged him to stop talking about it because it kills Wraith and he doesn’t care beyond that.

“Finally,” Ronon tells Sheppard.

“I know how to read,” the man retorts.

And it’s sort of true, Ronon thinks. Sheppard can read street signs and train schedules, for the most part. Or he’s memorized the routes he needs to take from Ronon and Melena’s house to the market and the base, the two places he goes the most frequently. And he manages at the market, too, but that might just be from recognizing what he wants to buy and pointing. He’s got to understand prices and the symbols printed on the Chyrika currency.

Ronon doesn’t argue, since Sheppard would probably be willing to stay illiterate out of spite, wandering into the kitchen and looking for a snack. Sheppard follows him.

“Rakai and Ara helped themselves,” he tells Ronon. “We’re kind of out of food.”

“We can order some Elizikyr,” Ronon says. “Melena will pick it up on her way home.”

Sheppard makes a face, even though Ronon knows he likes Elizikyr. “I haven’t eaten enough rats? And I had hamsters when I was a kid,” Sheppard mutters, mostly to himself. “Just because everything tastes good deep fried doesn’t make it right.”

Ronon checks the cold cupboard, unsurprised to find it empty except for root vegetables. He offers Sheppard a Fu-la-bee stem and Sheppard shakes his head. “Hamsters are fine,” he says.

They wash the Fu-la-bee roots together, anyway, mostly because Melena will be much more willing to pick up something greasy and delicious if she can pretend their diet is even a little balanced.

“So,” Sheppard says, flipping water droplets off the purple stems. “Rakai told me he’s going to write my story on my skin.” He looks at Ronon, face perplexed. “It sounded like a threat.”

Ronon has to try not to laugh, mostly because he can imagine the conversation Sheppard and Rakai had, with Sheppard pretending he knows what’s going on and trying to antagonize Rakai into actually telling him.

“What’d he mean by that?” Sheppard asks.

Drying off the vegetables, Ronon puts them in the steamer basket for dinner. Then, he turns around and shows Sheppard his arm.

“A tattoo,” Sheppard says, then scowls. “I should have figured that out. Rakai give you that?”

Ronon nods.

Sheppard peers at his arm, where the tattoo travels from his forearm up to the shoulder, circling both sides. “That?” He looks closer. “That’s a story? It doesn’t look like text.” That makes Ronon smirk and Sheppard catches on immediately. “I know what the letters look like,” he retorts. “That’s like…boxes.”

“You fill in the spaces,” Ronon says, “and some parts of the letters.”

He lets Sheppard grab his arm and turn it over curiously, like he can try to understand it.

“How do people read it?” he asks.

“They can’t,” Ronon says. “Unless they were there or you tell them what happened.”

Understanding passes over Sheppard’s face. “It’s a ritual.”

Ronon shrugs.

“Does it hurt?” Sheppard asks.

“Feels like that,” Ronon says, poking the unit tattoo Rakai put on Sheppard’s neck.

“It hurts,” Sheppard interprets. “It was a threat.”

“He owes you a beating,” Ronon points out and Sheppard scowls. “Melena won’t let him do it ‘til you’re better.”

“I am better,” the man retorts, automatically. Ronon feints like he’s going to jab him in the stomach with a finger and Sheppard scrabbles backwards so fast he slams into the cupboards on the other side of the kitchen. He glares at Ronon and then whips the Fu-la-bee stem he’s still holding at Ronon’s head.

~

After two months, Ronon’s squad is reactivated without their flight officer. It’s only to escort duty, serving as little more than bodyguards to Kell on his official state visits to various allies. Sheppard pouts like a toddler about being excluded, but he still hasn’t passed the health exam or the physical fitness test.

Ronon doesn’t think he’s missing much. The assignment feels more like punishment than anything else, like Kell wants to keep a personal eye on his unit. Non-combat escort duty pretty much guarantees Ara won’t get the chance to detonate another unauthorized weapon.

State visits are boring as hell. Without their flight officer, Ronon’s squad has to crowd in to Kell’s own state transport. From this, he learns that Sheppard is a better pilot than Kell’s chauffeur, information he definitely keeps to himself. For his part, Kell probably learns how obnoxious and irritating Ronon’s squad is when they have nothing to do and they practically have to sit in each other’s laps for hours on end in a tiny, uncomfortable shuttle.  Ronon’s the only one with any real ability to keep his mouth shut – Sheppard’s pretty quiet, but he’s not here – and the other four are excellent soldiers who quickly get out of control if they’re not actively fighting anything.

Taskmaster Kell has the rank and authority to get them to shut up, but it’s an order they forget repeatedly and Ronon doesn’t remind them. He wants off this assignment as soon as possible. They shouldn’t be getting punished for taking out a Hive.

~

Ronon judges that Sheppard is better when they go to the training room together and Sheppard can actually use the equipment without crying. They resumed their daily runs almost as soon as Sheppard came home from the hospital, but it’s a while before Ronon really has to pump his legs to keep up with him like usual. He’s pretty sure that the only injury that would prevent Sheppard from running is paralysis or leg amputations, so he doesn’t take the activity as a sign that Sheppard’s ready for the field again. But when he spars with Sheppard and the guy doesn’t wiggle and writhe like crazy to keep too much contact from being made with his injured torso anymore, Ronon decides he’s healed enough to come back to full duty.

Sheppard rolls his eyes and sighs dramatically when Ronon tells him. “Finally,” he says. But Ronon can tell by his posture and the set of his jaw that he’s genuinely thrilled.

Melena playfully pokes Sheppard in the gut about fifteen times the morning of his first day back. He still jerks away like he expects her touch to be agonizing, and it’s amusing.

“Just checking,” she says, when he dances away from her and puts the kitchen table between them.

The three months Sheppard spent recovering weren’t exactly wasted. Ronon’s pretty sure the guy has a decent mastery of reading Satedan now. He doesn’t know for sure, but Sheppard has accumulated a small collection of children’s learning materials and books, as well as one or two adult readings. He never asked Ronon or Melena for help, so Ronon never offered any. There’s not going to be a test, but learning the language of his new home is undoubtedly a good thing.

Sheppard only had two comments about the process, the first being “Where the hell did the vowels go?” when he switched to the teenage-level readings and then “Your language is ridiculous,” when Melena had asked how it was going.

Ronon had wanted to know if Sheppard was going to be able to write mission reports like the rest of the squad now. “Hell no,” Sheppard had said, pleasantly.

The squad has Sheppard back but they’re still on escort duty. At least they have their own ship back, too, now. Ronon makes very sure that Sheppard gets the right ship and that at no point is Kell on theirs. If Kell realizes Sheppard can actually keep a shuttle level for more than five minutes and land without making everyone’s teeth rattle, he’ll transfer Sheppard on to his personal staff and Ronon is not letting him steal his flight officer.

Fortunately, they only have a couple more escort missions and Sheppard never ends up flying Kell anywhere.

Sheppard asks Ronon about Kell one day, when they’re sitting alone in the ship while the taskmaster and the rest of the unit are off making arrangements to train with the Quasten military. Last time Ronon visted Quasta, he discovered he was incredibly allergic to some stupid purple plant that grew all over the damn planet. So, he’s staying in the ship, although he can still smell the stupid flower and it’s kind of making his eyes burn.

Kell’s pilot and Sheppard are staying with the shuttles because they couldn’t land anywhere close to the city, and it’s protocol to leave the pilots in the ships on missions like this. Just in case the friendly meeting turns less friendly, or there are unexpected Wraith.

So Sheppard and Ronon are alone in their shuttle, looking out on to the Quasten city lining the mountains. Ronon’s trying to remember what Melena told him to do to make his eyes stop watering and Sheppard has his boots propped up on the console, leaning back in his seat like he’s going to take a nap.

But Sheppard must be awake, because he abruptly starts talking. Well, first he reaches out and switches the radio transceiver to a different channel so Kell’s pilot can’t overhear their conversation.

Ronon notices when Sheppard changes the radio and stops rubbing his eyes long enough to glance over curiously.

“So,” Sheppard drawls. “What’s the story with Kell?”

“He’s a taskmaster,” Ronon says, automatically, almost sharply. This series of missions is the first time Sheppard’s spent much time with Kell. They met briefly when Sheppard first arrived on Sateda, but that hardly counts.

“Taskmaster, huh?” Sheppard asks, in the exact same tone, still mildly but pointedly curious. He takes his eyes off the windshield and looks at Ronon. “He a good guy?”

Ronon understands why he turned the radio channel. If Sheppard were Satedan, asking that kind of question is so far over the line.

Sheppard’s gone back to looking at his console and fiddling with controls, even though the engine’s off. He must feel Ronon’s eyes on him, because he reluctantly turns his face back towards Ronon. His expression is still mild and blank, like he’s just asking a harmless question.

He’s not Satedan, Ronon thinks. Asking that question isn’t totally different than asking how the trains work or wanting to know what he shouldn’t buy from the market. Except that Sheppard never asked those types of questions. He either figured it out on his own or watched Melena and Ronon ‘til it made sense.

“He’s a fair taskmaster,” Ronon answers, honestly. When he was younger, he had a somewhat more exalted opinion of Kell. Now, with a lot more combat experience, it’s tempered a bit. “He wants to be Chieftain,” Ronon says. “Eventually.” Kell would prefer sooner.

“Ambitious?” Sheppard translates.

Ronon shrugs. “Not what I’d want.”

Sheppard mulls that over for a bit. “Okay,” he says. “He’s really fucking interested in Ancestor technology.”

It’s not quite clear how the conversation reached that point, so Ronon just nods.

“You guys are doing fine without it,” Sheppard says, leaning further back in his seat and readjusting the way his legs are crossed. “Trust me.”

~

Ronon’s squad goes back to routine missions. It’s a fantastic change from escorting Kell around and everyone’s pretty much thrilled to be back to war games and off-planet missions, even when they run into Wraith. Hell, especially if they run into Wraith. Nothing’s really different except Sheppard has a few more marks on his torso that almost match the jagged scars on his back.

Rakai and Morika give him a different kind of mark a couple of months later. It’s not quite the beating Rakai promised Sheppard. Ronon doesn’t think Sheppard would let him do that, anyway. Let him try, maybe, but there’s way too much pride there on both sides to meet a reasonable end. And Morika doesn’t play that way.

Ronon comes home from a Master Specialist meeting on an off day to find half his squad in his living room. Melena isn’t home, fortunately, because she’d find this whole thing ridiculous.

Sheppard is stretched out shirtless on the living room floor. Morika straddles his back, pinning his right arm out and straight on the floor so Rakai can get to work on tattooing his forearm. It looks like there was a short fight – a chair is knocked over and a table pushed aside – but it was definitely for show.  If Sheppard really wanted to resist, he could easily send Morika flying and start a mean ground fight with Rakai. He’s willing. Or he’s unwilling to destroy Melena’s furniture, another possibility.

“Here?” is all Ronon says when he enters and takes in the scene.

Morika looks up at him, grinning. Her hands are already stained with blank ink and she’s leaving literal fingerprints all over Sheppard’s back.

“It’s clean,” Sheppard mutters, his cheek pressed against the floor.

Rakai just glances at him and shrugs. He has a large straight razor in hand. The wooden needle and the striker hammer rest by his leg, a small basin of ink right next to him. Ronon looks at the needle and winces on Sheppard’s behalf. That right there is Rakai’s vengeance for what happened on the planet that called Sheppard a Wraith-bringer. There’s no reason to use a tip that big.

“You’re too hairy,” Rakai tells Sheppard, brandishing the razor in a way that makes Ronon mildly concerned. He’s proud that Sheppard doesn’t show any fear.

“Don’t spill,” Ronon tells them. He can see they laid down towels under Sheppard’s arm – to soak up the blood – but if the basin tips, the ink will stain the floor forever.

Ronon leaves them to it, heading out of the room to clean up. While he bathes, he can hear some of the shaving process. Sheppard yelps occasionally and not surprisingly Rakai is taunting him the whole time. That’s gonna get old.

When Ronon finishes bathing and gets redressed, he joins them in the living room again. Sheppard’s arm is naked and bare from the elbow to wrist, and Rakai apparently resisted the urge to actually slash him. Two lines of tattoo circle the Runner’s skin right below his elbow. Sheppard found something to bite on when the hammer strikes, which explains why Ronon stopped hearing his voice about halfway through his bath.

There’s no shame in screaming, though. Ronon knows how much it hurts, but Sheppard is content with grunting into Melena’s cooking mitt jammed between his teeth, and also pounding his left fist against the floor in time with the rhythm of the striking hammer. Morika keeps trying to pin his left elbow down but she’s not doing a good job of it.

“Just so you know,” Sheppard says, spitting out the oven mitt. “Rakai, if I ever get the chance to tattoo something on you in a language you can’t read, it’s going to be entirely about the miniscule size of your dick.”

Rakai all but growls and brings down the hammer so hard Ronon automatically puts his foot down on Sheppard’s shoulder to keep the man from arching too far off the floor.

Sheppard pants for a couple of seconds after that, through his nose, since the oven mitt is back between his teeth. Rakai yanks the needle out of Sheppard’s skin and leans back on his haunches. The line is done on this side of Sheppard’s arm.

“Wanna go?” Rakai asks Ronon.

“It’s my turn,” Morika protests, bouncing impatiently on Sheppard’s back. Sheppard twists in annoyance, like that really hurts. She notices and immediately stops, only to drop her hands to his shoulders and squeeze. “Try and throw me off,” she dares. “C’mon.”

Ronon kneels down next to Rakai and finds a spare cloth to wipe the blood off what he’s done so far. The last line is about Sheppard capturing Rakai and Ara the day they first met him. It answers questions Ronon was going to ask Rakai out of Sheppard’s earshot: How did he intend to write Sheppard’s story when they know basically nothing of his life before about a year and a half ago?

“I’ll do the stuff before that later,” Rakai says, in response to Ronon’s unasked question. He assumes Sheppard will eventually tell them.

“Yeah,” Ronon agrees.

He flips Sheppard’s arm over to the other side and Morika reaches out to pin it down again.

Sheppard lifts his head off the floor and turns his face so he’s actually looking at Ronon. That’s probably a bad idea, since watching the needle go in can make you queasy when it’s your skin and your blood. He’s not surprised when Sheppard goes a little pale the first time he sees the blood wet towels under his forearm.

“This is so crazy,” Sheppard tells him, his eyes big.

“Don’t look,” Ronon advises.

Rakai doesn’t give Sheppard a choice, grabbing him by the head and roughly turning his face back the other direction. In return, Sheppard jerks his left arm out of Morika’s grip and clouts Rakai in the face, knocking him backwards. He grabs Melena’s oven mitt again and shoves it between his teeth again. He keeps his face turned away from Ronon.

Morika lies down across Sheppard’s back, using both her hands to pin his left side down.

“Don’t move,” she complains.

Rakai is sitting on Sheppard’s feet, probably going to do something painful and unnecessary that will make him wiggle. 

Ronon puts his elbow down on Sheppard’s bicep to keep his canvas still. He fills the needle and angles it directly below the man’s elbow, preparing to write about the day he first met Sheppard.

“You people,” Sheppard moans, muffled by the homemade gag. Ronon can’t identify the emotion in his voice, but it doesn’t sound angry, so he raises the hammer and drives his mark deep into Sheppard’s skin.

Ara and Hemi arrive before the night is out. Ronon lets them take their turns driving the needle. It takes a while to completely circle Sheppard’s forearm. And it’s good to let them all write Shepppard’s story, as they’re all in it.

By the end, no one’s even pretending to hold Sheppard down, anymore. Also, they’ve broken into Ronon’s liquor collection. The text closest to Sheppard’s wrist is going to be a little wobbly.

Melena gets home around this time. Ronon was kind of hoping they’d be done and gone by the time she arrived.

She just shakes her head, though. This isn’t the first time she’s come home to find the squad drunk and hurting each other. And she prefers they use her clean floor rather than the tavern.

“Almost done,” Ronon promises her, getting to his feet and leaning in for a kiss.

Melena tastes the alcohol on his breath and pulls away. “Tell me you didn’t let John drink,” she says.

Rakai squints at her from the floor. He’s very drunk. “Why not?”

“Tastes like piss,” Sheppard announces, which is his general opinion of every Satedan liquor and beer. He rarely drinks anything unless it’s being poured down his throat at the tavern.

“You want him to bleed out?” Melena snaps, toeing at the bloody cloths under Sheppard’s arm.

“That’d be okay,” Rakai mumbles, but he cowers a bit when she glares at him.

“Oh, right,” says Ara, leaning back on her heels. She gives Melena an innocent smile. She raises the needle up. “Wanna finish?”

Melena pauses and makes an uncertain face. “No,” she says. “I’ve never…” She looks at Ronon for backup.

“You do surgery,” he reminds her.

“That’s totally different.”

“C’mon, I’ll show you how.”

They get Melena on the floor, on her knees next to Sheppard without much argument.

“Just one more letter,” Hemi says, pointing at the last square of bare skin at Sheppard’s wrist.

“I don’t want to hurt him,” Melena says.

“You gonna wash it?” Ronon asks.

“Of course.”

“That hurts,” Sheppard mumbles in the floor. “Go for it.”

Melena peers at him. “What’s in your mouth?”

“Nothing.” He turns his face down so she can’t see.

Ronon guides her hands, though hers on much more stable than his because she hasn’t been drinking.

They fill the needle together and poise it above Sheppard’s wrist.

“You have to hit it hard with the hammer,” Ronon tells her.

“You do not,” Sheppard snaps, quietly. “Not that hard.”

“Shut up,” Rakai orders him.

“Otherwise the ink doesn’t flow,” Ronon says. “Hit it hard.”

Looking intently at her work, Melena raises the striking hammer and brings it down sharply against the needle.

Sheppard jerks lightly in place, then lifts his head off the floor. “Hey,” he says. “That didn’t hurt as much.” He puts his head back down. “I like you better.”

“Do it harder,” Ronon advises.

~

Sheppard’s been back in the field for almost eight months when the health bureau finally notices that he never officially passed either the physical performance test or the physical health assessment. Ronon just okayed him on the first thing and Melena jabbed him in the stomach a couple time with her thumbs and called it good. That should count, but it doesn’t.

The fitness performance test is easy. Sheppard goes to the barracks and proves that he is just as fast as he’s always been on his feet or in the sky and can hold his own in a fight even though he’s still smaller and shorter than the average Satedan soldier.

But for the health assessment, he has to go to the trauma hospital and submit to a full work up. This is easy, too, except Sheppard whines about it like they’re asking him to chop off a limb.

“Can’t you just do it here?” he asks of Melena.

“I can,” she says, which makes Sheppard grin.  “But it won’t count. I’m not in the military. They need an officer to sign off.”

Sheppard’s face falls, but then he glances at Ronon.

“A medical officer,” she points out, and Sheppard starts pouting again.

She’s totally forged a thousand health assessment signatures for Ronon, though, because getting checked out at the hospital can take an entire damn day and he likes her way more than any of the military Docs. Ronon’s not sure that anyone ever actually reads the signature on those things, but it’s not a good idea to teach Sheppard bad habits. If he got caught, they’d be a lot angrier at an alien Runner than they would be at Ronon.

“Go,” he tells him. “Get it over with.”

It does end up taking almost an entire day. Sheppard leaves in the morning with Melena, but doesn’t come back until late evening. He arrives home extremely pissed off and with his arms covered in bandages from repeated blood draws.

“They tried to stick me in the pediatric diagnostic machine,” he rants, slamming cupboards in the kitchen until he finds a stash of Oruva sticks. “That stopped being funny a year ago!”

Ronon catches Melena slapping a hand over her mouth to hide her grin. Sheppard sees it, too, and glares.

“It’s not funny,” he repeats.

“They clear you?” Ronon asks, keeping his tone neutral. Sheppard the tiny Satedan soldier is always going to be funny, but the man looks like he’s spoiling for a fight and Ronon just wants to go to bed, so he’s not gonna harp on it.

“Of course,” Sheppard says, still scowling. He looks disappointed that Ronon isn’t going play along and help him get the aggression out.

“Good,” Ronon says, reaching out for Melena’s arm to pull her upstairs. “Night.”

“Night,” Sheppard says, crankily.

~

Five days later, Sheppard bails on a mission.

“I don’t think I should go out today,” Sheppard says, coming into the kitchen while Ronon’s eating breakfast. He’s not dressed, wearing only his woven sleeping pants. He says it totally casually, but Ronon almost chokes on his juice.

“Why not?” he asks. Sheppard wanted to go out when he was so injured a three-year-old could have dropped him.

“I don’t feel so good,” Sheppard says, his tone so mild it almost doesn’t sound like an admission. “I have a really bad headache.”

“Headache,” Ronon repeats, staring at him. Sheppard nods, one hand up rubbing absently as his temple. “You don’t wanna go out.”

“I want to go out,” Sheppard says, a little defensively. “I just don’t think it’s going to be safe for me to try to take a flying Satedan tank up today.” He sighs. “I don’t think I should fly today,” he says, more genuinely. “Sorry.”

Almost instantly, Ronon’s concerned. He doesn’t need to be a doctor to tell that Sheppard has to feel really shitty to refuse to fly. He’s also never heard Sheppard complain about being hurt or sick. Ever.

“I’m gonna go back to bed,” Sheppard tells him, reaching out and snagging a slice of Werstul fruit off of Ronon’s plate. “Sleep it off.”

Ronon doesn’t think it’s an accident that Sheppard waited until Melena left the house to come to him and make this confession. He knows it isn’t.  Melena would have brought Sheppard to the hospital with her. Ronon’s tempted to call her, but Sheppard’s looking at him tensely like he’s afraid Ronon’s going to do just that.

“I just need sleep is all,” Sheppard says. “I think.”

He’s pretending like it’s a hangover, from Rakai’s brother’s birthday two nights ago. Ronon had left early for dinner in with Melena, but he still doesn’t think Sheppard drank enough to be feeling it now.

“Okay,” Ronon says. He doesn’t blame Sheppard for wanting to wait it out. “Have some Ya-ki-ris tea,” he suggests. “For your head.”

Sheppard nods and Ronon watches him while he retrieves the satchel of little dried leaves from the cupboard and crumples them into the water-boiler pot.

“Who you gonna get for a flight officer?” Sheppard asks, waiting for the water to bubble.

“We can walk,” Ronon says.

Sheppard kind of grins, then pours himself some tea. “See ya,” he says, heading back to his room with the cup in hand

“I’m gonna tell Melena if you’re not better by tonight,” Ronon informs him.

The Runner doesn’t stop walking, but he does look over his shoulder long enough to shoot Ronon a dirty look.  

~

The day’s mission goes fine, simple war games with another Master Specialist’s unit. They’re outnumbered and they’re on foot, but they still win. It’s good practice. Ronon tells the squad about Sheppard’s hangover, for which they’re going to mock him mercilessly when they see him again.

Sheppard’s not home when Ronon returns. He finds a note on the kitchen table, Satedan glyphs written in Sheppard’s sloppy scrawl.

Greetings, it says, Market for buying meat sticks and drug tea. To be feeling average now, Sheppard.

Ronon has to read it a couple of times, not terribly impressed with Sheppard’s new literacy. But at least he feels better, well enough to leave the house. Maybe it was a hangover; some ales don’t hit you until days later. That’ll teach Sheppard to let Rakai order his drinks.

Alone in the house, Ronon takes a very long bath. He rinsed off at the base but doesn’t feel clean. It’s the rainy season, now, and the war games all day were spent wading in mud up to his waist. Days like this he seriously considers slicing off his dreads for how messy it can get.

Melena gets home while he’s in the bath. He hears her walking around the kitchen, the cupboards opening and closing. The water is cooling around him, so Ronon reluctantly rises and starts to dry off. She barges in on him while he’s patting his dreads, and she’s almost as wet as he is.

“Hey,” he says. “Raining?”

“My train was late,” she says, rolling her eyes. “Flooded track. It floods every rain season, you’d think they’d do…something.”

She gets distracted because Ronon grabs her and helps her take off her soaked clothing.

“John,” she protests, half-heartedly, when he pulls her into the tub.

“He’ll knock,” Ronon says, “or I’ll kill him.”

“Not nice,” she murmurs, but it’s practically into his mouth.

They forget about Sheppard for a while, then, until they come out of the bathroom newly clean and dry.

Ronon sees Sheppard’s note on the table next to the beginnings of dinner. Melena’s marked it up with red corrections. It makes him smirk.

“Cut up the Oruva steaks for me,” Melena requests, tossing vegetables into the steamer. “Why didn’t John go out today?”

“Hangover,” Ronon says, finding the appropriate knife to start shredding the meat.

Melena makes a face. “You didn’t warn him about Kavra ale?”

Ronon shrugs. “He didn’t ask.” That gets him a dirty look.

“Should we wait for him?” Melena wonders, watching him carve up the Oruva.

“No,” Ronon says, mostly because he’s hungry.

He goes to throw away the meat wrappings and notices the empty tea satchel sitting in the bottom of the garbage pail. That’s kind of strange. There’d been a lot left this morning.

Melena sees him staring at the garbage and comes to look, too. “What is it?”

“Sheppard finished off the Ya-ki-ris,” he says, dropping the meat wrappers on top of it. “He said he had a bad headache.”

“I thought you said you made him stay home because he had a hangover,” Melena answers.

“He said he didn’t feel safe flying,” Ronon says, honestly. “Because he had a hangover.”

“He stayed home willingly?” Melena is staring at him, suspiciously.

Ronon shrugs like it’s no big deal. “Yeah.”

She pulls the steamer basket out of the water. “We’re waiting for him,” she says.

“Okay.”

“What else did he say?”  Melena continues. She looks both concerned and pissed off.

“Headache,” Ronon repeats. “Didn’t feel okay.” He walks back to the table and finds Sheppard’s note. “He felt better,” he defends himself.

Melena is still squinting at him. “You should have called me. That’s not like him.”

Ronon goes back to slicing up the Oruva. “He’s not a kid.”

Melena just rolls her eyes. “You both are.”

They wait for Sheppard for only a little while. It’s unsettling, mostly because Melena starts to look worried. Also, it’s still pouring rain and it’s dark outside, now.

“When did he leave?” Melena asks, interrupting the silence as they sit at the kitchen table.

“Before I got home.” Ronon pulls his chair out and stands. “I’ll go look for him.”

Melena’s hands are fidgeting on the tabletop. “He wouldn’t have stayed at the market for four hours. Where are you going to look?”

Ronon shrugs. “You said the trains are backed up.”

“I’ll come,” Melena says, starting to stand up.

“No.” Ronon doesn’t need her along to make him more anxious. He already wants to smack Sheppard upside the head. “Just make dinner. I’ll bring him back and you can yell at him, then.”

~

Ronon has no idea where to look. He puts on his jacket and pulls the hood up, heading out into the downpour. The market is open all night, but most of the stalls are closed and empty. It’s not some place to stay if you have a home to go to.  All the same, that’s where Sheppard said he was going.

Melena’s right about the trains. They’re extra slow. With the limited overnight schedule, it’s actually almost faster for him to run across the city. He runs where he can, until there’s no more sidewalk and he has to wait for a train. The rain is not letting up at all and he’s completely soaked. The weather is cool enough to make being wet, even in his waterproof jacket, totally suck. He has no idea what Sheppard was wearing when he left.

The market is empty except for an after hours cleaning crew sweeping up the floor. Ronon asks them if they’ve seen anyone around, gets a bunch of headshakes.

A lot of Satedans know Sheppard. They don’t know his name or anything about him – especially not that he was a Runner – but they do know he’s an alien Flight Officer as he kind of stands out when the squad moves around the city.

Next, Ronon catches another train and checks the tavern. It’s unlikely, but it’s close to the market and maybe Sheppard got the bright idea of drinking his headache away. Unsurprisingly, the building is closed and locked up tight.

 He heads to the base. Not because he expects Sheppard to be there, but because he needs to get in touch with the rest of the squad. He doesn’t think any of them are with Sheppard, but it’s worth a try. Probably should have checked with them before he hauled his ass all over the city. Worry is itching in his chest and Melena’s probably sitting at home stewing, getting madder and madder.

Ronon arrives on base really pissed off and literally squelching in his boots. His clothing and hair are soaked. It’s almost early morning now. He should be exhausted but mostly he’s too tense to think about it. After alerting the squad, he’s gonna have to contact the security forces and send the cops to find Sheppard.

He doesn’t have to do that.

A young arms officer sees him squeezing out his jacket and hurries over before he even makes it past the coatroom.

“Hey, I was just about to call you?”

Ronon blinks at him. “Why?”

The arms officer shoves a sheet torn off a message pad into his hands. “Security forces office called. The cops picked your alien Flight Officer up for public drunkenness. They want someone from military justice to go get him.”

“Where is he?” Ronon asks, finding his chest suddenly light with relief. Relief and annoyance because there’s no reason he should be getting this worked up over a grown up who can take of himself. He lets out a breath.

“Detention center on the east side,” the arms officer tells him, pointing at the message.

Sheppard has no business being over there. It’s not a great area and there’s nothing there that Sheppard even knows about. Ronon rolls his eyes and goes to put his coat back on.

It takes a long time to get to the detention center. It’s way on the other side of town and the trains are running even more irregularly that direction. By the time Ronon gets there, the sun is actually beginning to peak above the horizon and orange is streaking the skies.

Ronon’s been to a detention center a couple of times. Sheppard’s not the first idiot on his squad to do something really stupid. The building is black and grim and the inside is dirty and smells. People only stay here until they go home or go to court.

“Flight Officer John Sheppard,” Ronon tells the desk receptionist. She recoils when she looks up at him. He figures he looks both really angry and really filthy, tries to give her a tight smile to show he’s friendly.

A security officer leads him back to the cells. He doesn’t see Sheppard until they get to a large, group-sized cell in the very back. It smells of alcohol and vomit, and there’s a man in handcuffs lying passed out on the floor.

Sheppard is sitting chained to a bench against the wall, elbows propped up on his knees and his head in his hands.

“That one,” Ronon says, pointing. “That one’s mine.”

The officer unlocks the cage and enters. Ronon stays outside and watches while Sheppard is unlocked from the bench and pulled to his feet. Upright, Sheppard looks okay. Stubbly and tired – and really not happy – but not hurt. Sick, maybe. The officer pulls him out of the cell by the upper arm. Sheppard looks at Ronon but doesn’t say anything.

“You’re gonna take him to military justice, right?” the officer says.

Ronon reaches out and grabs Sheppard hard by the back of the neck. “Yup,” he lies.

The officer lets go of Sheppard’s arm and gets Ronon the arrest report before they go. The civilian security forces don’t automatically transfer records to the military justice department. So when Ronon drops the paper folder in a deep puddle on their way back to the train station, no one else will ever find out about this. But he reads the report before he destroys it: some cop found Sheppard, wobbly and disoriented, sitting on an out-of-service train and not getting off. He told the cop he couldn’t remember how to get home and promptly got arrested.

Sheppard’s not drunk. He smells, yeah, but not of alcohol.

“What the hell?” Ronon asks, when they’re finally seated on the train. That’s also when he lets go of Sheppard’s neck.

“I got lost,” Sheppard mumbles. He glares out the window at the sunrise. “Your cops are dicks.”

“I think you’re sick,” Ronon tells him.

“Am not.” Sheppard curls against the window. He doesn’t say it very emphatically. “Maybe.”

Ronon takes him straight to the doctor. Home, that is, to Melena.

“Oh, thank Yrorix,” she says, when Ronon pushes Sheppard through the door. “John, where the hell were you?”

“He got lost,” Ronon reports. He shoves Sheppard in her direction. “And arrested.”

“I called you both in sick,” Melena says, reaching out for Sheppard’s face. “Come here.”

“Good.” Ronon wants to collapse on the couch, but he’s still wet and filthy. “He probably needs to go to work with you.”

Melena’s trying to check Sheppard out, feeling his forehead and touching the glands under his ears. He’s not cooperating, though, stepping just out of her reach. When she tries to grab him by the neck and pull him up, Sheppard violently knocks her arms down and wrenches away.

“Ow,” Melena cries.

Ronon’s between them in a second, staring at Sheppard in shock. “Hey,” he warns.

“Don’t touch me!” Sheppard snaps. He takes another step back. “I don’t know who the hell you are.”

~

They end up calling an emergency medical transport vehicle to take all three of them to the hospital. In the fifteen minutes it takes to arrive, Sheppard repeatedly says that he doesn’t know them.

It’s really fucking weird, and it upsets Melena, which upsets Ronon, and it’s just all around awful.

Sheppard has to be convinced to get into the transport vehicle. He does, mostly because if he doesn’t get in voluntarily, Ronon’s going to make him.

“Did he hit his head?” Melena asks, when Sheppard is settled on the patient transport board and glaring at them both like he’s never seen them before. “Did the cops hit him?”

“I don’t know,” Ronon says.

The paramedics examine Sheppard’s skull then, ruffling his already disheveled hair.

“I don’t feel any bumps or lumps,” one says. “No blood.”

They get Sheppard undressed down to his underwear – not something he wants but between the two guy paramedics and Ronon he doesn’t really have a choice. There aren’t any visible injuries on his body, either.

One of the paramedics fingers the upraised scars on Sheppard’s back and Sheppard tries to launch himself off the gurney. Ronon shoves him back down and hold him there.

“What are these from?” the paramedic asks.

“He was a Runner,” Melena says. Her voice is thick like she’s going to cry.

“What about these?” asks the other, pointing a gloved finger to the more recent scars on Sheppard’s chest and belly.

“He was a Runner,” Ronon repeats.

~

Melena ends up waiting with Ronon at the hospital. She gets them into the staff lounge, at least, instead of the visitor waiting room. Her colleagues kick her out of the exam room. She’s a trauma doctor, after all. They could use her if Sheppard had taken an axe to the head, but he hasn’t. And they can’t even use the excuse that he knows her, because right now he doesn’t.

She interrogates Ronon while they’re waiting, like she can diagnose Sheppard through his answers.

“He hit his head on any missions lately?” She asks. “Rakai smack him around? Even playfully?”

“No,” Ronon says. “Yes. No.” She looks at him. “No,” he says. “I would have made him go in if I saw something serious. You know that.”

“Yrorix,” Melena curses. “He’s been here almost two years, never even got a cold.”

Ronon nods, puts his arm around her shoulders even though his coat sleeve is still damp.

“The Wraith tracker,” she says, abruptly. “It was so close to his spine. Who knows what kind of poisonous shit it pumped into him.”

“We don’t know anything yet,” Ronon reminds her. He is not going to think about that.

“Something did this to him,” Melena says. “Made him sick.”

“Could be just something that happens to his people,” Ronon suggests. He likes that better than the Wraith poisoning him. “We don’t know anything about them.”

Melena scowls. “He’s young and healthy,” she says. “No one his age just gets sick like that.”

A grey-haired male doctor enters the lounge, clipboard in hand. “Dr. Dex?” he says, approaching.

Melena rises, Ronon stays seated.

“What is it?” she asks.

He shrugs apologetically. “Nothing obvious,” he says. “Flight Officer Sheppard doesn’t appear to know where he is or who he is.”

“He deteriorated on his way here,” Melena gasps. Ronon’s not sure that’s true. Sheppard barely said a word once he was out of his cell. He might have been keeping silent because he had no idea who Ronon was.

The doctor tells Melena about which blood tests they’re running, stuff which goes right over Ronon’s head but seems important to her. Unfortunately, the results won’t be back for 48 hours.

“We’ll admit him,” the Doc says. “Might have to put him in the psyche ward, though.” Melena makes a distasteful face. “I’m sorry,” the guy says. “I know he’s your friend, but mentally he’s not on this planet.”

“We’ll take him home,” Ronon says, standing up. “He doesn’t have to stay here.”

“No,” the Doc begins, but Melena interrupts.

“Yeah,” she says. “We can release him under my care. I can observe him at home."

“Melena,” the Doc says. “That’s not a good idea.”

“Yeah, it is,” Ronon says. “He hates hospitals.”

~

It probably wasn’t a good idea to take Sheppard home, but that’s what they do. They unofficially hijack an emergency medical transport vehicle and its driver to take them back. Melena sits upfront so the guy thinks it’s official business. Ronon stays in back with Sheppard, except really with a guy who looks like Sheppard and acts like a lunatic.

The lunatic pretends like he’s falling asleep on the gurney. And when Ronon lets his own eyes drift shut, Sheppard slams an elbow into his jaw, swipes a knife out of one of Ronon’s sheaths, and kicks the rear doors open. He jumps out of the moving vehicle and rolls down a grassy incline next to the road before Ronon can stop him.

Cursing, Ronon jumps out after him. He hears tires squealing as the driver must have seen what happened in the rear. Ronon doesn’t look back, giving chase after Sheppard. He doesn’t have time. Sheppard can outrun him and his only chance of catching him is if Ronon gets close enough to take him down.

They’re both tired – neither of them slept last night – and that’s probably the only reason Ronon can even keep Sheppard in sight. He chases the man underneath a bridge, through a shallow stream, and into the thick forest that stretches on beyond the highway at the edges of the city. The tangled, root-covered floor slows them both down. Sheppard gets his foot caught on something and that gives Ronon the chance he needs.

He launches himself off his feet and tackles Sheppard to the ground. The forward momentum sends them both rolling, but Ronon keeps fierce hold on the other man’s shoulders.

They end up in a tangled heap on the forest floor, but Sheppard’s on top of Ronon and he’s holding the knife he stole against Ronon’s throat.

“Hey,” Ronon tries, and Sheppard presses the knife harder against his skin. His eyes are wide with fear and confusion. He doesn’t look like he wants to hurt Ronon, but the knife blade is cutting into him. “I know you don't remember everything. You have no idea what's going on. You're confused, maybe even a little scared. I know I would be. But you have to trust me.”

“You chased me,” Sheppard retorts, but he leans back a little.

“We're friends,” Ronon tells him. “I don’t want you to get hurt. The things we've been through together, no disease can wipe that away, not completely.”

Sheppard stares down at him, forehead creased in thought like he’s trying to believe Ronon, but can’t.

“OK, deep down, you know I'm telling the truth,” Ronon says. Sheppard just blinks at him, face uncertain. “Give me the knife.”

 Feeling a little safer, Ronon shifts on his elbows like he’s going to sit up. Instantly, the knife is tight against his throat again.

“Oh, nice try,” Sheppard snarls.

Ronon drops, flat on his back in the dirt again. Exasperated, he doesn’t try to convince Sheppard that he’s gone crazy. Another minute of getting his breath back, he can wrestle the knife away. “Fine,” he snaps.  “Then kill me. Then you'll be all alone in the middle of the forest, with no idea who you are, where you're going or what you're gonna do next. How could I possibly make it any worse?”

Abruptly, Sheppard sits back on his haunches, the knife pulled away from Ronon’s throat. He considers that statement, while Ronon thinks about starting a ground fight.

“That’s a good point,” Sheppard mumbles, throwing Ronon’s knife into the dirt, blade first. He climbs off of Ronon’s hips and stays sprawled on the ground next to him. Slowly, Ronon sits up.

“Wanna go home?” he asks Sheppard, taking his knife and putting it back in its sheath.

Sheppard stares at him. “I don’t know where home is,” he says.

~

The emergency medical transport vehicle is waiting for them on the side of the highway where Sheppard bolted. Melena sits on the guardrail, face pale and panicky. Ronon can see her take a huge sigh of relief when he and Sheppard appear through the trees.

“I didn’t think you could catch him,” Melena whispers, as they escort Sheppard back into the rear.

“Of course I can,” Ronon replies. He ties Sheppard to the patient gurney with restraint straps for the rest of the journey home, though.

He doesn’t think Sheppard remembers running or surrendering; in another fifteen minutes Sheppard is asking Ronon who he is and where they’re going. He’s suspicious and paranoid, more so now because he’s tied up, too.

“We’re going home,” Ronon tells him.

“Why am I tied up?” Sheppard demands.

“Because you tried to run away.” Ronon leans back against the wall of the vehicle. He is completely exhausted.

“Why’d I run away?” Sheppard asks.

“I don’t know.”

“Who are you?”

“Your friend.”

Sheppard pauses for a while, as if out of questions. Then, “Who am I?”

“My friend.”

~

They move Sheppard’s bed into the main room, afraid he’ll go out his bedroom window if they let him alone in there. He falls asleep in it, though it’s the middle of the day and all the lights are on. On top of the sheets, after only a few questions about where he is and what they’re doing to him.

“He’s exhausted,” Melena whispers, from the kitchen where she’s finally making dinner from last night.

“I know.” Ronon’s exhausted, too. Hungry, too. He walks over and leans against the wall nearest her.

“I called the base,” Melena says. “Told them we’re under quarantine and you and Sheppard won’t be reporting for duty for the next few days.”

Ronon blinks at her. “Quarantine?”

She shrugs. “He has a fever. That means he has some kind of infection. It might be contagious.”

Now there’s something he hadn’t thought of. “You think?”

“I think if it is, we’re already exposed,” Melena says. “We live together, share food…”

Ronon nods. The squad, the cop who arrested Sheppard, and whoever he was sharing a cell with have also probably been exposed.

“So, yeah,” Melena says. “Quarantine ‘til the results come back.”

“And then?”

Melena looks down at the steamer basket full of vegetables and shrugs. “I’ve never seen anything like this, Ronon.”

~

The next two days suck. Ronon’s paranoid for himself, waiting to be struck with a headache and start to lose his mind. It doesn’t happen and when he checks with Melena, she claims to feel fine, too.

Sheppard does not feel fine. They take turns watching him, like guard duty. It’s better when he’s sleeping. When he’s awake, he’s paranoid, unhappy, and trying poorly to hide his terror.

He’s not aggressive, anymore, though. Ronon doesn’t worry about Melena watching him.

Their friend has no short-term memory. No matter how many times they tell him his name, their names, and that he lives there, Sheppard forgets within a half hour or so. And then he starts up with the same line of questions. It’s annoying as all hell and it’s also frighteningly sad.

“I don’t think I belong here,” Sheppard tells Ronon, utterly sincerely the following afternoon.

“Yeah, you do,” Ronon replies. “You live here.”

“I don’t think so.”

“Well, you do.”

Sheppard paces the confines of the living room while Ronon watches from the couch.

“This isn’t my home.”

“Yeah, it is.”

He’s had the same conversation with Sheppard about fourteen times. Melena had it another thirty that morning.

“I think I belong somewhere else,” Sheppard says. He looks at the front door, which is locked and bolted.

“We’re all you got, buddy,” Ronon says. “Sit down.”

Slowly, Sheppard obeys. He sits next to Ronon, but with a lot of space between them.

“Read a book,” Ronon suggests. He tosses one of the children’s books at Sheppard. “Stop looking at the door. You aren’t going anywhere.”

Sheppard catches the book and opens it. He glances at the pages then closes it.

“I can’t read this,” he tells Ronon. “I don’t know this language.” He scowls. “I knew this isn’t my world. You’re a liar.”

“It’s your world now,” Ronon says, having had this argument too many times today to try and convince Sheppard of it again. “Look at the pictures.”

“Dr. Hexarl said he’ll call as soon as the results are in,” Melena tells Ronon when they switch off guard duty after dinnertime clean-up. “The morning, if he can.”

“Good,” Ronon says. He figures Melena hates this as much as he does.

“You know,” Melena says, tilting her head at where Sheppard is bedding down. “There’s one thing good about this.”

Ronon stares at her, disbelieving. “What?”

“He sleeps through the night,” Melena says. “He doesn’t scream anymore. He doesn’t wake up.”

“Because he doesn’t remember,” Ronon says. “That’s not good.”

Melena shrugs. “I know,” she says. “But I wouldn’t mind if those memories are gone for good.”

Ronon disagrees. He knows Sheppard would, too, even though he’s lying still and slumbering in the living room. However awful the memories are – the ones that make him shriek and arch awake every night – they’re part of Sheppard’s life and among all he has left of his world.

~

Dr. Hexarl calls the next day at lunch, contacting Melena on her hospital transceiver that’s been sitting ominously on the table all day.

Melena answers and listens intently, silently for a few minutes.

“Are you serious?” she interrupts, looking shocked. Ronon watches her, waiting. She sounds surprised but not upset, like the Doc didn’t just give Sheppard a death sentence. “I’ll bring him in right away,” she promises. “Send another hospital vehicle, please.”

She turns off the transceiver and lowers it from her ear.

“Kirsan fever,” she tells Ronon. “Can you believe it?”

He stares at her. “Adults don’t get that,” he says. “And they don’t get it like that.” He points where Sheppard is surveying the living room with suspicion.

“Satedan adults don’t get that,” she replies. “It was only a matter of time before he was exposed to something he didn’t have immunity to. Maybe this is what happens when adults get Kirsan fever.”

Ronon shakes his head, unbelieving. “I had it when I was ten,” he says. “It was just the flu.”

“The hospital got a family in from the Corolus colony,” Melena says. “The children had a new strain of Kirsan fever. Sheppard must have been exposed when they were teasing him in the pediatric ward.” She makes a face. “Hey, there’s a patch of Enchuri plant growing outside by the curb. Would you go pick it all?”

“Aren’t you going to give him a shot?” Ronon asks.

Melena nods. “It can’t hurt to make him eat some,” she says. Ronon waits a second, just looking at her. “One of the Corolus colony children died.”

So, Ronon jerks a handful of Enchuri plant up out of their tiny yard. Melena washes it, puts it in a bowl with some oil and a dash of spices, and they give it to Sheppard as a salad. He eats it, slowly and resentfully, while they wait for the hospital vehicle to arrive.

At the hospital, Sheppard gets a whole IV bag full of Enchuri extract and spends the next day unconscious. Melena and Ronon stay the night in the empty gurney on the other side of the room, waiting for him to wake up.

When he finally does, it’s a huge relief to see recognition in his eyes when he looks up at them.

“Hey,” Ronon says.

“Hi, John,” Melena says, petting his hair until he pulls away.

“How long have I been asleep?” Sheppard asks, sounding like his usual self.

“A day,” Ronon tells him, to which he makes a face.

“How’s your memory?” Melena asks, though Ronon can tell just by the way he’s looking at them.

“I know who you are,” Sheppard says. “And I know who I am. And I know where I am. And I know I want to go home.”

“Good enough,” says Ronon, reaching out to pluck off Sheppard’s IV. Eager to leave, Sheppard gets dressed quickly and Melena speeds up the discharge process.

“Can I kill those guys in pediatrics?” Sheppard asks, as they walk down the hospital corridor.

“Sure,” says Ronon.

“No,” Melena says. “I’ll take care of it.”

“We have to go to work tomorrow?” Sheppard asks Ronon, when they arrive home.

“I haven’t told them you’re out of quarantine yet,” Melena says.

“Good.” Sheppard nods. “I know I just slept for a day, but I feel like I need to do it for a whole week.”

“Me too,” Ronon says.

“My bed is in the living room,” Sheppard observes, tilting his head.

“We had to watch you,” Ronon tells him. “You kept wanting to leave.”

“Not so much,” Sheppard says, stripping the sheets of and picking up his mattress. He carries it off towards his bedroom. “G’night."

“Sleep well,” Melena calls after him.

Ronon and Melena go to bed shortly after that. It’s been a long, hard, and awful few days. He’s going to ask Melena not to mention Sheppard’s better for a while, though eventually the squad is going to show up at their door. Ronon’s almost asleep when his wife elbows him lightly in the side.

“Hrm?” He lolls his head towards her. “What?”

“Hear that?” Melena whispers.

Ronon does. It’s Sheppard, screaming.

~please feed the author~