Sabine Bauer - Mirror, mirror

Along the edges of his vision streaked the people at the perimeter, hands clapped over open mouths in that universal gesture of frightened astonishment and incomprehension, but John's attention was riveted on the gate itself and the bizarre dance it had begun. At first it had been a mere shudder, but now the large metal ring was hopping and shaking itself into a fullblown rumba, working loose from its fastenings and slowly tilting forward.

It could have keeled backward just as easily, but of course that would have meant things were actually going in their favor. Duh!

John gave an angry little grunt. This would be interesting, to say the least. How much did a Stargate weigh? He was sure that the exact tonnage could be found in some manual or other, or that somebody must have mentioned it in the course of those endless briefings prior to the departure of the Atlantis expedition, but right now nothing sprang to mind. So it probably was as good a time as any to find out how powerful the upward thrust on those jumpers really was… and he'd better find out while he still had some leverage to speak of.

Careful to avoid putting unnecessary pressure on a chevron and potentially damaging the mechanism, he nosed the bow of the jumper against the upper curve of the gate. For a fraction of a second he achieved a precarious balance; the Stargate steadied and ceased its wobble, then it started to lean on the jumper, weighing it down, making its hull groan and forcing its bow downward.

"Son of a…" John hissed between clenched teeth, resisting the temptation of just stepping on the gas and knocking the damn thing the other way.

Instead he opened the throttle a fraction at a time, trying not to think of what lay below and what his chances of survival would be if the jumper took a nosedive and ended up at the bottom of the ravine with a Stargate on top. The engines shrieked with the strain, and a battery of warnings lit up the HUD like a Christmas tree. John felt sweat pouring down his neck and back-the ultimate in absurd, as it wasn't him doing any of the lifting. Then, agonizingly slowly, the Stargate reversed its motion, still pressing down heavily, but rising and, at least for the moment, safe despite the quake rattling on around it.

Eventually a faint, final tremor rumbled its last, and John risked relaxing cramped shoulders and various other parts of his anatomy. Other than almost toppling the Stargate, the quake seemed to have done very little damage. Their lab tent was still standing, so was the awning over the dialing console. Along the safety perimeter, people who'd dived to the ground rose, dusted themselves off sheepishly. In the evacuee camp above folks were dousing minor conflagrations and beginning an equally minor cleanup.

So far, so good.

Just as he was about to let out a sigh of relief, two things occurred to him: a) he and the jumper were stuck here for the duration, and b) in the unlikely event that anybody should take it into their heads to dial out, he and the jumper were toast.

"How is he doing?" Teyla asked between gasps.

"Same as before," replied Ronon without losing his stride-such as it was.

The trek up from the river valley back to the farmlands and beyond to the ruins of Atlantis had proved a gold-plated nightmare. He'd carried Rodney all the way, counting his blessings; Charybdis could have seen fit to turn McKay into a morbidly obese middle-aged slob instead of a scrawny teenager. That aside, he was still alive. Heavy as lead, his body relaxed in unconsciousness, but alive. Ronon had carried enough corpses to be able to tell the difference.

Day had broken a while ago, diffidently and without adding much in the way of light, and it was still raining. In other words, they were still wet as drowned rats, but at least they were warm now, muscles burning from the exertion. They'd seen hardly anybody on the road; a handful of youngsters driving cattle and an old man on an ox-drawn cart. Each time they'd ducked into the bushes by the roadside and waited until the traffic was out of sight; precaution as much as necessary rest.

For the past hour or so, ever since they'd passed the last farm in the valley, there'd been no further encounters. Ronon was picking his way carefully, trying to spare McKay any unnecessary jolts or, worse, a fall. The footing was treacherous, slippery with mud and uneven with roots and rocks, but at least they were somewhat sheltered from the rain and, more importantly, from any prying eyes. Other than their own harsh breathing, the only sounds now were the soft tap-tap of raindrops sliding from branches, the occasional crack of a branch trodden on, and here and there the rustle of a small animal scurrying through the undergrowth.

Eventually, the trees ahead were beginning to thin out and the sullen light drifting through the canopy was getting a little brighter.

"We're almost there," he said.

If Teyla had heard him, she gave no indication. Or maybe she simply refused to buy into this show of assurance. Fact of the matter was, he had no idea what to do once they reached the ruins. According to McKay, the power supply to the dialing console had been interrupted somehow. Then again, when he discovered the ruins his memory hadn't been firing on all cylinders, so there always was the faint possibility that he simply didn't know what he was talking about.

On that bracing thought, Ronon stumbled from under the shelter of the trees and out into the clearing around the ruins to be greeted by a gush of rain. By now he'd given up even on blinking it from his eyes. It just was. Next time he'd get himself stuck in a desert.

In front of him the ruins rose silently, shrouded in moss and vines. Water cascaded down the steps toward the gate and pooled on the tiles, deep enough to hatch trout. Past the bushes and trees that crowded the gallery he caught glimpses of overgrown, decrepit consoles and, scattered around those, bleached bones. The place seemed undisturbed, and it didn't look as if anyone had been here since his and Teyla's arrival two days ago. He'd half expected a bunch of zealots camping out here to ambush any heretic daredevils who might come sightseeing, but apparently the zealots had headed into town along with everybody else.

Ronon dropped to his knees and eased McKay off his shoul ders as carefully as he could. Teyla staggered to a halt behind him, head cocked, like a doe scenting the air. "It's safe," she said at last, allaying his lingering worry. "There's nobody else here."

Good. Thank the elements for small favors!

"We have to wake him up somehow," he said.

"I know. Let me…"

Without being able to explain why, he rose and stepped back. It wasn't really a privacy thing, because all Teyla did was cradle McKay's head in her hands, massaging it gently and uttering a litany of half inaudible murmurs. Ronon thought of the guard at the city gate and figured the guy-if he was still alive-would be hollering witchcraft again right about now.

"It's nothing of the sort," Teyla replied softly. "I'm simply stimulating certain pressure points."

He could do with some stimulation, too, Ronon admitted silently. There'd been plenty of occasions during his years as a runner when exhaustion and soreness had become a permanent state of affairs, but this was in a league of its own.

Whatever Teyla was doing, it worked. McKay gave a protesting groan and opened his eyes, blinked, groaned again. Clothes plastered to his body, he looked painfully thin, and his face was pale enough to make his skin appear translucent, a sure sign that the bleeding hadn't stopped. If he didn't get medical help soon… Ronon swallowed a curse.

"Don't move, Rodney!" ordered Teyla. "And stay with us."

The response was a grunt, then McKay closed his eyes again. More massaging.