kriadydragon

Helpless

The Seehecians were lying. Ronon was being punished. He was helpless. He hated being helpless. It shredded him inside, took him apart piece by piece with each roar and curse and rattle of the sturdy wooden bars that formed his cage. It laughed at him and spit in his face, taunted him with the promise that it would all be over if he would just do something – that he could do something, he just wasn't trying hard enough. There Sheppard was, only ten feet away, within sight sprawled on the ground and within hearing as he screamed; Ronon's gun, six feet away on a rickety table. It was agony, so how could it not be punishment?

Today they had Sheppard tied shirtless to stakes on the muddy earth. They'd already poured the truth drink down his throat, coaxed nightmares from him with gentle questions, and were now forcing the dream drink into him while the Dream-Maker in his skin robes and featureless mud-mask whispered in his ear.

Ronon gripped the wooden bars white knuckled. “Sheppard! Sheppard, don't listen!” He could see Sheppard's increasing breaths in the rapid pulse of his chest. “Sheppard!” Hear it, ragged and wet, above the thunder of his own heart. “What are you doing to him? Leave him alone!”

Sheppard began to struggle, baring his teeth in feral panic, his grunts just as animal-like. Without ever moving his hidden face from Sheppard's ear, the Dream-Maker slid a gnarled, muddy hand up Sheppard's flank until it rest in the center of Sheppard's chest, and pressed.

The pilot arched his head back and screamed every drop of oxygen out of his lungs. Ronon thrash.

“Leave him alone you son of a bitch!”

They'd just needed help, him and Sheppard. A wraith attack had separated them, Ronon had hurt his ankle and his head, and Sheppard had dragged most of his heavier weight to this village of mud and straw huts hidden in a cleft between two cliffs. There had been no reason to assume hostility from simple dirt-diggers who'd cringed away from the more powerful weapons of the strangers. Ronon had been too out of it to consider the possibility, and Sheppard too preoccupied with worrying about Ronon and Wraith to do the same.

And the villagers had been so friendly, so eager to help. Just not without a price – one swallow of the truth drink by the leader, Sheppard, because these were a helpless and timid people who wanted to trust while knowing better than to give trust away. Even Ronon's injuries hadn't slowed his brain down enough to miss a people hurt by more than just the wraith.

It had slowed his brain the right amount to feel complacent in the belief that there was no way a primitive truth elixir was going to work. Ronon blamed it on McKay's contagious skepticism having finally rubbed off.

The serum had worked, a lot. Sheppard had said more than intended, and the Seehecians now had someone to incriminate for the Wraith waking before it was time.

But they were a peaceful, non-violent people who'd promised to only punish, not kill.

The Dream Master pressed harder, Sheppard screamed louder. What the hell did they think this was doing to Sheppard if not killing him?

When the Dream Master finally pulled his hand away, it was to run it through Sheppard's hair like a father soothing a distressed child. More was whispered, too low for Ronon to hear. Not that he needed to hear. He could see the increase of Sheppard's agitation clear as glass even from where he was trapped. Sheppard's chest stuttered with each breath, his eyes shimmered, and then his head began to thrash back and forth in violent denial.

“No. No, that's not how it happened, that's not...” Sheppard whimpered and arched in a useless attempt to squirm free. “No, they didn't... Kolya didn't... they were alive. No, they... no... No! No! That's not... that's not what happened! That's not what happened! No!”

The Dream-Master shook his head sadly and continued his caressing as men in wooden armor and leather cut Sheppard free. Spears were thrust into the cage, forcing Ronon far enough to the back for the cage door to be opened and Sheppard dragged in. They dumped him like a boneless carcass in the center and quickly shuffled out.

Ronon let them. With Sheppard head-deep in a hallucination, escape would be next to impossible. Sheppard also needed help coming down.

The Dream Master stood before the cage. “Not long,” he said in a paper-dry voice muffled by the round mask with the too-small eye holes. “Not long. Three more in light, two more in dark.” In other words, three more days, then it would be over.

Ronon wasn't sure if Sheppard would last that long, not after two whole weeks of it. The pilot was strong. He was also human and the visions were vivid and precise. Things were being seen by Sheppard that were like invisible hands tearing out his heart and shattering it over and over – day after day after day. Even Sheppard could only endure so much. Ronon didn't want him to have to endure any more.

It was after the Dream-Master finally walked away that Ronon gathered Sheppard to the back of the cage. Ronon sat and pulled Sheppard up against his side, covering him with his coat. Sheppard curled up, shivered, twitched and rolled his glassy eyes in drunken confusion. He'd felt light when Ronon had lifted him, and felt frail huddled against him. Since day one of being force-fed the dream drink, Sheppard was lucky if he managed five swallows of the watery white whey they were served three times a day. If he didn't throw it up, he spit it out thinking it was something else, and Ronon was able to see and feel Sheppard's ribs with a lot more clarity than what was comfortable.

Three more days. Sheppard didn't deserve three more days of this crap.

The pilot made a small noise like a pained grunt that wasn't far from being a whimper. “Ronon? That you?”

“Yeah,” Ronon sighed. “It's me.”

Sheppard shivered harder and curled tighter. “Oh. Sorry I got you killed.”

“You didn't.” It was turning into a play, now. Every line rehearsed, every word out of Sheppard's mouth variations of the same guilt and confusion. The truth liquor revealed fears and the dream liquor scrambled the brain just enough to make them seem real. Sheppard had few fears, but Ronon had come to figure that the fewer the fears, the more brutal and vicious they were. Sheppard's biggest fear was one that never wearied of scenarios for the Dream-Master to play on.

“Yeah I did,” Sheppard protested with a brow bunched in groggy confusion. “The Wraith fed on me, then fed on you, 'an Rodney, 'an Teyla. Kolya thought it was hilarious. I yelled, tried to make him stop. He just laughed.”

Ronon gripped Sheppard's bony shoulder, firm while still gentle. “That didn't happen, Sheppard. You escaped, we survived.”

The creases in Sheppard's brow deepened. “Oh. Th-thought – thought as much. Kolya killed Elizabeth. Moved her so my bullet hit her.”

“No,” Ronon said.

“But she's gone.”

“Not because of Kolya. Because of nanites.”

Sheppard's head bobbed. “Because I didn't save her -”

“Because she made a choice to save us.”

“Carson -”

“Sheppard!” Ronon barked. Sheppard flinched, so Ronon softened his voice. “Don't.”

“Sorry,” Sheppard mumbled. He trembled and twitched and coughed dryly. “I'm sorry.”

“Don't be.”

“I'm sorry for what I did.”

“Sheppard -”

“I'm sorry I woke them...”

“Stop -”

“I'm sorry I ever came to this damn galaxy in the first place.”

“Sheppard -”

“I flipped the damn coin twice because I wanted to come, I just wouldn't admit it. I should have listened to it the first time. I touched the necklace. I brought them, I woke them. I -”

“Sheppard, stop!” Ronon roared loud enough to feel it vibrate through his bones. Sheppard started violently with a gasp and gripped the front of Ronon's shirt with the tenacity of a man clinging to a cliff's edge. Sheppard's trembling was different. Not in a way Ronon could describe, he just knew it, could feel the subtle alteration that had less to do with being exhausted and more to do with fighting not to shatter.

“I'm sorry,” said Sheppard, emotionless as the Dream-Master's mud-mask, so tired the mere sound nearly turned Ronon's bones to liquid.

Words weren't going to fix this, so Ronon didn't even try. You don't force clarity on a man who couldn't see. Until the dream liquor was out of Sheppard's body there was nothing Ronon could do, and it made him sick with sorrow that couldn't be completely buried by fury. He hated leaving Sheppard like this, hated it so bad he could barely breathe. Had Sheppard not been here, in need of warmth and the solid presence of someone he thought was dead, Ronon would have rattled, kicked and tore at the cage until it fell. Then he would grab his gun and make the Dream-Master pay.

Instead, he resigned himself to providing what little comfort he had to offer by rubbing Sheppard's naked, chilled back up and down over his spine.

“Gettin'... little too friendly... there... big guy.”

Ronon grinned. Even Sheppard needed the grounding that touch brought from time to time or he would have pulled away by now, worn out or not.

Sheppard eventually shivered less, hopefully asleep with Ronon soon following after. Not much point on wasting energy staying awake in a cage, and he was always up before the Dream-Master came.

He woke even earlier to the smell of burnt ozone and the crackle that could only come from stunners. His eyes snapped open to chaos – screaming villagers on the run and masked Wraith drones marching around the huts like exterminators driving out the vermin. One drone, paused to take in his surroundings, turned his sights on the cage and moved toward it.

Ronon tensed, pulling his feet beneath him in a crouch. The drone ripped the cage door open like it was made of twigs, aimed, and fired. Ronon ducked the blast and lunged for what Sheppard would call a pile drive into the creature's midsection in a double move that brought the wraith down and Ronon right next to his gun still on the table. After ramming his elbow into the masked face, Ronon grabbed the gun, switched settings and blew a hole right where the Wraith's face had been. He didn't waste a second getting back to his feet and Sheppard, hauling the weakened man upright. The noise and sudden disappearance of Ronon had woken Sheppard, but the dream drink was still in his blood and brain, making him limp, uncoordinated and spooked.

“Ron'n?” he slurred.

Ronon pulled Sheppard's arm across his shoulder, keeping his coat pinned between them. “Wraith!” He dragged Sheppard from the cage to the nearest hut and twisted just in time to avoid a stunner hit. “They found the way through the canyons.” Though Ronon had expected them a lot earlier, but then scaling that pass had been how Ronon had hurt his ankle.

They ducked behind another hut, then another, Ronon firing at any wraith unfortunate enough to turn its head at the wrong time and spot them. The village was an obstacle course of unconscious bodies and panicked people trying to flee. A male villager in wooden armor clipped Sheppard, nearly pulling him from Ronon's hold.

“People,” Sheppard grunted, cupping his breastbone where the villager's elbow had struck.

Sneering, Ronon blew the mask and half the hair from another Wraith. “After what they did to you?” Another Wraith lost the top of its skull. Ronon hauled Sheppard behind a pile of wood where they crouched.

“My fault,” Sheppard said. “My fault.”

“No, it isn't.” Ronon popped up like a veras rat from its hole and sent another mask and scalp flying.

“My fault they're here. I woke 'em.”

Ronon fired, another mask melted and another drone went down. “Yeah, so you woke them a little early, big deal. They always wake up, they always take people. Sooner or later doesn't make a difference. They'll always come, people will always be too scared stupid to fight, and the Wraith will always win. At least you fight back. You and you're people are the first since my people to fight back.” His next shot took a Drone's arm off, and his next burned a clean hole straight through a black-armored chest.

“I've been to planets where they sacrifice their people to the Wraith – their elderly, sick, crippled. Hell, even their children when that doesn't work!” He finished off the arm-less wraith with a shot to the side of its face. “You made a mistake trying to do the right thing. I once made a mistake because I was sick. What the hell is their excuse!” A Wraith who got too close lost its entire head, and the way was finally clear for now. Ronon pulled Sheppard to his feet and ran to the next nearest hut. “I don't blame you, Teyla doesn't blame you, her people don't blame you. Sooner or later – doesn't make a difference Sheppard.”

Their next dash brought them to a hut already being used by a woman and her child cowering against the wall. A Wraith materialized around the other side and shot them both unconscious, then crouched and pulled the child away so it could reach the mother.

“Ronon,” Sheppard said, louder, clearer, more urgent. He looked up at Ronon with a fierce expression and steeled resolve.

Ronon clenched his jaw, wanting to shout “no” for what they had done to Sheppard. But Sheppard's look was both an order and a plea, because Ronon might be able to live with this in the moment, but Sheppard couldn't.

And Ronon realized that there was a difference. They were here, now – Ronon, Sheppard, his people, Atlantis. Sheppard had woken the Wraith forcing a war so few in this galaxy would or could fight, leaving it up to a people from another galaxy – complete strangers who'd made a mistake they could have easily turned their backs on – to do the fighting. Ronon had said it – not since his own people...

Sooner or later didn't make a difference, unless there were some willing to fight and make it worthwhile; which was better than nothing in Ronon's book.

Ronon aimed and opened up the Wraith's skull just as it was gathering the woman into its arms. He carried Sheppard toward the safety of the hut and nearly buckled when Sheppard became a dead weight in his arm. Ronon didn't hesitate wondering what the hell had happened. He twisted around and fired, twice, the first hit knocking the stunner from the Wraith's grasp and the second burning open the Wraith's neck. With no more Wraith in sight, Ronon finished dragging Sheppard to shelter and gently lowered him to the ground. Crouching over Sheppard's comatose body, he pressed his fingers into the pilot's neck, feeling the thready pulse.

He tried not to think about what a stun blast might have done to Sheppard's already weakened body. He narrowed his world to that body beneath him and any Wraith stupid enough to show its featureless face.

They went down, one after the other, each blast of electric vermilion sent off with an animal roar tearing from Ronon's throat. This was the difference. With each village the Wraith attacked, with each planet they descended upon, there was a chance – finally a chance – that it would cost them. And even if in the end the Wraith won and the galaxy returned to its cycle of death and reprieve, at least the Wraith would be left looking forever over their shoulders.

They would know that humans were not helpless, and that was better than nothing.

Four more Wraith died by Ronon's gun, four more roars of defiance the last sound they heard. But his attention had been forward and only forward. When his body convulsed in a cloud of pale blue, he didn't even have time to be surprised when darkness slapped over his eyes.

--------------------------------------

Ronon awoke to the clean chemicals that he only ever scented in a human-made infirmary, the hum and beeps of human-made machines, and the softness of human beds supporting his body. But when he opened his eyes, it wasn't to the copper and blues of Atlantis.

Then Rodney's face popped into sight hovering over head, smiling like a fool, and that made everything completely right in the world. McKay called for a nurse, and as Ronon was checked over, explained everything rapid fire and in a single breath, it seemed.

“You and Sheppard never make things easy. We had to park the 'jumper a half mile out and had to take the long way around where there weren't any Wraith. By the time we showed up, it was to you and Sheppard being dragged away, and what the hell happened to Sheppard?”

McKay didn't give Ronon the chance to answer when he launched into a technical-packed explanation about how the 'gate on the planet had been damaged in an electrical storm, trapping the wraith and preventing Atlantis from returning with help, forcing them to wait for the Daedalus. Or so Rodney assumed it had been an electrical storm. He stammered about trying to make it back as soon as they could, how his and Teyla's own escape had been slowed by more incoming Wraith, how they couldn't just beam Sheppard and Ronon up due to something in the rock of the planet causing interference with the subcu transmitters, then stumbled over apology after apology until Ronon clasped him on the shoulder and smiled.

“You came. That's good enough.”

Which coaxed a rather pathetic yet still sincere smile from Rodney. It was immediately dropped when Ronon explained what happened to Sheppard.

As soon as Ronon was given a clean bill of health, he grabbed the nearest chair and parked himself next to Sheppard's bed. The pilot was still unconscious, his face tight and lined by troubled sleep that Ronon wouldn't be able to wake him from for a while. Teyla was there, holding Sheppard's hand, and Rodney staring in horror and concern at Sheppard's thin body and the blood-flecked bandages around his chafed wrists. When it was time to rest and the nurse attempted to chase them out, Ronon stayed, using logic for once rather than intimidation – Sheppard had been drugged, which meant that when he woke, he would be disoriented. Being disoriented meant he might react violently. Having a familiar face around would decrease the chances.

So the nurse let him stay.

Ronon was dozing with his chin to his chest when a high-pitched moan snapped him back awake. He blinked at Sheppard shifting and his head rocking back and forth, fighting his way back to consciousness. Sheppard woke calmly, dazed and confused and with only a little hesitant fear until his head rolled in Ronon's direction.

“Ronon?”

Ronon leaned forward, taking Sheppard's hand to ground him with physical contact whether he liked it or not. “Yeah, it's me.”

Sheppard blinked. “You're not dead?”

“Nope.”

“I thought...”

Ronon shook his head. “Just a dream.”

Sheppard looked away. “Oh.” Only to look back, wide-eyed, the heart monitor speeding up. “The village, those people...!”

“Atlantis got there in time, kept them from being taken where the darts could pick them up.”

Sheppard visibly relaxed, the heart monitor with him. “Good. Good. They didn't deserve that.”

“Even after what they did to you?”

Sheppard shrugged. “I woke up the wraith -”

“Sheppard,” Ronon said firmly, squeezing his hand.

“Sorry.”

“Don't be,” Ronon said, placing Sheppard's hand beneath the blankets, then the other because Ronon thought he looked cold. “And I'm glad you listened to that coin, came to this galaxy. Wouldn't have it any other way.”

Sheppard's snort was derisive, almost self-deprecating. “Why? I made things worse.”

“It's always been worse,” Ronon said. “You made things different.”

“And that's a good thing?” Sheppard asked, doubtful.

Ronon grinned. “More than you know.”

The End