TITLE: Unrelenting Past

AUTHOR: Aelfgyfu

RATING: PG-13 (language, violence)

CATEGORIES: gen, action-adventure, drama, friendship, team

SUMMARY: A simple mission to get everyone back up to speed after the events of "Phantoms": just a friendly planet with a medical problem and some pleasant scenery. Past decisions, however, still haunt the present. Team plus Carson.

SPOILERS: Set after "Phantoms," with spoilers for that and previous episodes.

WARNINGS: some bad language, violence, political incorrectness from Rodney

AUTHOR'S NOTES: Many thanks yet again to Redbyrd and to my Brilliant Husband for close readings, catching errors, and making many great suggestions. Remaining errors are solely mine.

DISCLAIMER: Stargate: Atlantis and its characters belong to MGM-UA, Gekko, Glassner/Wright Double Secret Productions, Stargate SG-1, Stargate (II) Productions, Showtime/Viacom, NBC/Sci Fi, and no doubt other persons or entities whom I've forgotten (this list keeps getting longer). No copyright infringement is intended. In fact, my stories make no sense if you haven't seen the shows, so I encourage you to watch! And get all the DVDs! Just like I do!

The Unrelenting Past

by Aelfgyfu

John rubbed at his eyes and took another swig of coffee. He really needed more sleep. It was almost enough to make him see Heightmeyer—but not quite. He had nothing against her; he just didn't like to talk to shrinks. And he really didn't need to. Everyone had trouble sleeping and bad dreams now and then.

"John? Are you all right?" Teyla asked after she sat down, drawing Ronon's attention as he came into the briefing room as well. Even Lorne glanced over.

Damn. He didn't think it showed. "Not a great night," he admitted.

"Shoulda come to the gym yesterday," Ronon said with a grin. "I bet you'd have slept better."

John didn't feel quite ready to fight Ronon again yet. Dr. Beckett said the big guy was ready for duty, but it hadn't been that long since John had shot him. Of course, it wasn't like he ever beat Ronon. Maybe he should try some hand-to-hand with him again; having Ronon wipe the floor with him might actually make him feel better.

Elizabeth came in, as bright and alert as always, despite the fact that Rodney was talking her ear off and sat down next to her so that he could continue to tell her about some recent catastrophe.

"Have you seen Dr. Beckett yet this morning?" she asked John when Rodney made the mistake of pausing to wait for an answer.

"No, I haven't. You want me to radio—"

"Sorry I'm late! Had a bit of a—oh, never mind." Carson dropped into a chair next to Rodney." He was a little out of breath. Running to get to the briefing, or nervous about what he probably suspected was an off-world mission?

When Elizabeth met with John yesterday after debriefing Lorne and his team on their return, she'd told him that she was concerned their CMO had been avoiding going off-world again. Beckett had been verging on phobic when they first arrived in the Pegasus Galaxy, but he'd improved for a time. Then, a few weeks ago, he'd lost a patient because of a damned Wraith machine messing with his mind. Once Elizabeth mentioned it, John realized Carson had been avoiding missions: he'd sent Biro to give kids shots, for God's sake. It was time for Beckett to get off Atlantis again, and this mission was as good as any, and better than a lot they got. He hoped. Elizabeth wanted Carson to go on this mission, and she had enlisted John's help. She wanted Sheppard's team both because he had first met with the Jaqui and won their trust, and because there were so many unknowns. The lead team might get in more trouble than any of the other teams, but they'd also gotten out of more trouble than any of the other teams.

John led off the briefing, reminding Teyla and Rodney about their first meeting with the Jaqui and bringing Ronon and Carson up to speed. Sheppard and his original team—he still couldn't think of Aiden Ford without a pang—had met the Jaqui in their first few months on Atlantis. 

John still smarted a little at the memory of being caught off-balance when they first came to this planet. The team had been scouting the area when suddenly they'd found themselves faced by three people with crossbows. They'd been told there were more bowmen they couldn't see, and Sheppard had looked over McKay's shoulder as Rodney stared hopelessly at the Life Signs Detector, trying to tell people from animals.

Instead of being captured or killed, however, they had been invited to make themselves comfortable on the ground and put their weapons down, which did not make any of them comfortable. After waiting long enough to become quite well-acquainted with the flora in their immediate vicinity—if only they'd had Parrish along, at least someone could have had fun—they met with two more natives who smiled all the time while the soldiers, or hunters, or whatever they were, never moved.

It turned out that the Athosians knew of them. They occasionally traded with these people, who called themselves the Jaqui, but they had always met them on some other planet; Teyla had not even recognized the address when they dialed it, because no Athosian had ever been to this world, as far as she knew. The Jaqui admitted they prefer no one know their homeworld, and one old man said they'd have left them to think the planet uninhabited, but they had gotten too far from the Gate.

Finally, to Sheppard's surprise, the Jaqui had agreed to allow them to check back every season to share news and see if they could ever be of assistance to one another. Sheppard figured it was a waste of time, but it wasn't a waste of his time; other teams had always checked in with them, usually Lorne's. 

Here Lorne took over. Yesterday, his team had made the regular contact. Always before, they were greeted with smiles and a fruit drink, and then asked for news. The flow of information had always been pretty one-sided before, with news from the Jaqui always turning out to be trivial or something they already knew.

This time, however, the Jaqui seemed more serious—"although," Lorne commented, "they didn't forget the fruit juice." They requested medical help, Lorne explained, saying that Sheppard's team had initially offered that as a possible item of trade. Lorne said they seemed healthy, and they had been assured there was no major contagion, just a few difficult cases for which they could use assistance. The Jaqui had explained that they'd concluded from their appearance that Lorne and his people were far advanced.

McKay snorted. "Yeah! They're running around with bows and arrows!"

"Crossbows," Teyla corrected. "They are deadly weapons."

Ronon smirked. "And a simple bow and arrow was enough to take you down!"

"Let's stick to the point," Elizabeth said in a voice that didn't sound loud but somehow carried. "Major Lorne, your assessment?"

Lorne nodded. "They seemed sincere." He ignored the noise from McKay. "They've always been friendly and unthreatening—"

"Aside from the time they held us at gunpoint! Well, arrow—arrow-point!"

"I thought arrows were not dangerous weapons?" Teyla asked in the sort of tone of voice that might fool someone who didn't know her into thinking she was asking an innocent question.

Beckett spoke up. "You must have gotten some kind of description of the illness."

Lorne shook his head. "Sorry, Doc. They asked if anyone of us was a healer, and Sanchez said he was a medic and offered to take a look. But they said they wanted a real healer. They were kind of apologetic, but they've always kept to themselves, and when they said they didn't want anyone to see their sick until a fully-trained healer came..."

"Doesn't that strike anyone as suspicious?" Great time for Rodney to get perceptive—just when Elizabeth and John wanted to present a mission as simple and safe. "They don't even have real doctors, just healers, and yet they can make a distinction between a doctor and a medic?"

"My people use the term healer as well," Teyla answered, her features hardening. Oh, McKay was really putting his foot in it today.

"Sanchez is a soldier," Beckett said reasonably. "That's obvious from his clothes and weapons."

"Not if you don't know that yellow is the medical color!" 

Lorne frowned, considering. "Well, they did ask if he was a full healer—"

"So of course you told them the truth?" McKay asked incredulously.

"Hey! Who decided to tell the nice people with the ZPM that we weren't really Ancients?" John couldn't help but ask.

"That was years ago!" Rodney's voice went up a little. That little misstep must still be a sore spot.

"Well, we can certainly send someone to have a look, if you think it's safe," Carson said, surprisingly unperturbed.

Lorne looked at Sheppard. "I saw nothing to indicate any danger, sir, and we've been going there every few months for two years now."

"So, you think it's worth checking?" Elizabeth asked Carson.

Carson frowned a little. "I hate to turn down people asking for medical help. Especially when we've known them so long and they've never done us any harm."

"Good," Elizabeth said, and she had her mouth open to say more, but the doc hadn't finished.

"And we have a new doctor on staff who hasn't been off Atlantis since she got here," Carson continued. "Think this would be a good mission for her?" He looked at John.

John had expected Carson to volunteer somebody else—that had generally been the doctor's MO since they got to the Pegasus galaxy—but he hadn't expected Carson to look to him for approval.

"No, I think it might be a good mission for our CMO!" John shot back.

"Why?" Beckett's forehead wrinkled. 

"He has a point, Carson," Elizabeth answered smoothly while the doctor's head swiveled to look at her. "You haven't been off-world in a while." 

"Gotta keep you up to scratch," John said with a grin as the doctor turned his head to face him again.

"Dr. Keller did just arrive on the Daedalus; perhaps we should give her more time to get her bearings?" Elizabeth suggested, and sure enough, the doctor's head went back. This was kind of fun. John was glad he'd sat opposite Elizabeth.

So of course John had to get the next word in. "They're long-time allies that you haven't met, Doc! You've gotta come!"

That made the doctor's mouth pop open, but no words came out.

"It is a tropical planet," Teyla announced with a smile. "You have been working so hard on Atlantis; you deserve some time away."

Okay, that line of reasoning didn't exactly follow the others, but he'd take it. Elizabeth had said she didn't want this to come down to an order, and Sheppard agreed. What they really wanted was for the doc to want to go off-world, but that was too much to hope. He'd settle for not getting too much argument.

Sadly, Rodney wasn't with the program. "Tropical! You make it sound like a vacation spot! Think Central America: heat, humidity, mosquitoes—" Fortunately, Carson's head had now turned towards the man next to him, so he couldn't see the simultaneous death glares Rodney received from various parts of the room.

Of course, it wasn't clear McKay had seen them either.

John jumped in. "Think beautiful women, not wearing a whole lot—" 

Oops. Now John was getting the Look of Death from both women in the room, and a smirk from Rodney, but Teyla broke it off to say something else encouraging, and Ronon expressed great interest in seeing this planet.

"But I don't like the heat," Beckett finally said, when he could get a word in.

"Well, suck it up!" Rodney said unexpectedly. "I have to go to all these horrible climates; why shouldn't you?" 

"Beats the cold," Sheppard said.

"At least if it's cold, you can put on more clothes!" Beckett shot back.

"Hey, you can always take something off." Ronon, wearing some sleeveless get-up, eyed Carson up and down. The doctor squirmed in his long-sleeved t-shirt and lab coat.

Lorne suddenly had a coughing fit. "It's not that bad, honest," he chipped in a moment later when he could speak. "They're really friendly, Doc." He even managed not to say, "for people who don't like outsiders," which he must have been thinking.

John wondered if Elizabeth had gotten Lorne on board, too.

"They always offer us drinks, and sometimes food," Lorne continued. "And their food's pretty good, actually."

"And they haven't shot you—yet," Rodney added sharply .

It took a while for arguments to be settled and details to be worked out, but in the end, John had what he wanted. Beckett was going. John gave Elizabeth a nod and a grin as they left the room after everyone else, and she smiled back.

*****

Carson had been given less than one day to pull himself and his pack together to treat an unknown number of patients suffering from unknown ailments on a planet that had neither asked for help nor offered information in the previous two years. He couldn't stop them from dragging him along—although he certainly had made a strenuous effort—but he could make his displeasure known. 

So he did, at some length. The pack felt like it was getting heavier and heavier, so after a while, he threw in: "I've got enough in my pack for a whole laboratory because no one could tell me what I might be dealing with." He tossed dirty glances around the team, though they were too intent on tramping through the greenery to pay any attention to him, he feared. They'd been walking through jungle from the Gate for well over an hour already, and he was soaked with sweat. He hated being sweaty. The huge trees that towered over them kept direct sunlight off them for the most part, but the heat and humidity were still bad enough. It had to be 30° in the shade.

He'd much rather have sent someone else. Jennifer Keller was new and enthusiastic; she should get a chance to go off-world. He'd told Doctor Weir that, but she had sided with Colonel Sheppard for some reason.

They refused to acknowledge that things always went badly when Carson went out with a team. Especially this team, for some reason. Maybe he should have asked to go with Lorne's team. Rodney didn't want to come anyway.

"Well, I have no idea what's wrong with any of those people, so you can't blame me," Rodney answered him when no one else would. "In fact, I have no business being on this expedition at all, and they made me carry some of your stuff because Colonel Sheppard said I wasn't packing as much equipment as usual! But of course that's wrong, because I figured I had better bring my instruments just in case we encountered any technology we missed last time." He snorted. "Fat chance of that. I don't know why I bother. Except that it would be really useful to have another ZPM—"

"Zee!" John exclaimed suddenly. "It's zee! Not zed! Zee! Zee Pee Em!"

"Well, zed is what the civilized world calls it. Right, Carson?"

Carson agreed automatically, but then he considered that it had been a very long time since he last heard Colonel Sheppard arguing with Rodney over how to pronounce the final letter of the alphabet. Perhaps he and Rodney were overdoing the complaints just a little. On the other hand, it been all too recently that John had felt so guilty over shooting Rodney that he'd let Rodney get away with almost anything. It was good to hear John sniping back at Rodney, in a purely figurative sense.

That mission where they'd been shooting at each other had been a rescue mission, Carson remembered. And what were they calling this?

Rodney had picked up the litany of complaints where Carson left off. Carson was impressed that Rodney could speak so fluently while clearly a little winded.

"God!" Sheppard interrupted. "If I wanted a whine tour, I'd have gone to Napa Valley!"

Yes, he was steamed—in more ways than one. Carson felt a little guilty. Everyone was hot; everyone had heavy packs. Walking through the jungle had lost its appeal some time ago.

He might even have apologized, except that Rodney said, "Napa? Isn't that a kind of cabbage?" It was too good a chance to pass up.

Even Carson had heard of Napa Valley wines, so he knew Rodney must have done. But he found himself agreeing: "Aye, I think you're right, Rodney."

"Used in Chinese food," Rodney replied sagely.

Sheppard huffed loudly.

"I do believe that's correct," Carson said, though he'd never made any Chinese food himself and really couldn't name many of the ingredients.

"I miss Chinese food," Rodney said with genuine longing. "Toronto has the best Chinese food anywhere. Outside of China, of course," he added hastily. Odd. Carson thought Rodney didn't even like exotic foods. "Peking duck.... Now that's the greatest. It has two courses. The first is just the skin, done all crispy. And the sauce...."

Sheppard groaned. "How'd you like some lemon chicken right about now, McKay?"

"Indian," Carson said wistfully. "I could really fancy a bite of vindaloo right now. I haven't had any since before Antarctica!"

Rodney began extolling the virtues of a good curry.

"Food." Ronon's deep rumble from the front carried back to them. "You got them talking about food again, Sheppard."

"It's not my fault!" an exasperated Sheppard answered. "I wasn't talking about food! I was talking about wine. It was a pun—whine and wine, get it?"

"Oh," Rodney said, turning enough that Carson could see a convincing blank look on his face. "You mentioned cabbage. What does wine have to do with cabbage? Or whining, for that matter? Unless it's whining about cabbage. I mean, does anyone really like cabbage?"

Barely holding his lips back from a betraying grin, Carson answered, "I like cabbage just fine, thank you very much. But cabbage wine doesn't sound very good to me." He managed to sound very dubious.

"You drink wine made from cabbage?" Teyla inquired curiously: cabbage or something like it seemed to grow everywhere in the universe, and the Athosians had it too. Carson almost felt guilty again. Almost. 

"No! No, we do not drink wine made from cabbage! At least I don't think we do...." Sheppard's voice was really taking on an edge. "I don't. Napa Valley is where grapes for wine are grown, and these two clowns would know that if they ever got out and lived a little."

"They grow grapes among the cabbages?" Carson asked Rodney in an undertone just loud enough to carry back to where Sheppard brought up the rear.

"Huh. Maybe it's one of those symbiotic things, where the cabbages put into the soil some of the nutrients that the vines take out."

"Ooh, I've heard of such things," Carson agreed. "My mum says—" 

Sheppard relieved him of the need to make up anything for his mum to have said with a strangled cry. "You can't really be that stupid! Either of you!"

Carson turned and looked at the colonel. Sheppard's face was even redder than Rodney's. He must be angry. Teasing him like this was not fair. But then again, Sheppard insisting that if Carson wanted to help these people, he had to go himself, and not send Keller or someone else, wasn't fair, either. 

"Napa Valley is just the name of the valley where they grow the grapes! It doesn't have anything to do with cabbage. I think," Sheppard added, then winced at his own admission of uncertainty.

"And where is this Napa Valley?" Rodney asked imperiously.

"California, you dope!" 

Rodney looked at Carson. "California wines," he said with a hint of condescension.

"Ah. California wines." Carson gave Sheppard an uncertain look.

"You know, we're all stuck on this planet together for at least the next twenty-six hours," Sheppard said. "So if I were you? I'd quit before I really pissed one of us off."

Rodney started to bluster.

"You have to sleep sometime," Ronon called back, tossing a look over his shoulder.

Carson let it go, and he was relieved that even Rodney decided to keep still for a while.

*****

Sheppard was partly relieved to hear Beckett needling the team, because all too often the past several months, the doc had been silent, though in a good mood he talked as much as Rodney. He was also partly annoyed. Heat he could handle, but he didn't like the humidity. Worse, there was no obvious path from the Stargate; they kept pushing their way through vast amounts of foliage that simply closed up behind them again. He didn't like it. He couldn't keep his bearings, and that made him nervous. And they'd been walking for well over an hour, and the two men just wouldn't shut up!

McKay was in fine form today, and John knew he should just be grateful that Rodney had stopped reminding him that he'd shot him. He was truly thankful that Rodney had healed quickly and fully. He should be go easier on him. Wasn't Rodney's fault he'd slept badly again.

Then again, Rodney wasn't getting the worst of this exchange. Sheppard seemed to be the clear loser here, at least until Ronon threw in his threat. 

The landscape around them seemed to be changing. Instead of towering trees and dense undergrowth, they were suddenly walking among medium-sized trees, and the bushes and ferns and whatever else they were walking through seemed to be thinning out.

"Almost there!" shouted the guide cheerfully from the front of the line. Taban was short, like all the people they'd met here, and Sheppard didn't know whether to be amused or impressed at the sight of the little man keeping pace with Ronon by taking three steps for every two of Ronon's. A little of each, maybe.

"Oh, thank God!" the doctor exclaimed.

McKay muttered something John couldn't quite hear, and he didn't ask Rodney to repeat it.

The guide was right, and not fifteen minutes later, a welcoming party greeted them in a small pavilion under the trees with some kind of fruit drink (which McKay declined even after Beckett assured him there was no hint of citrus) and a varied luncheon spread. They'd had lunch a few hours before on Atlantis, but by now they were hungry again, and between the walk and the change in the time of day, Sheppard knew they'd all need the food. They ate under a pavilion with open sides and a thatched roof, sitting on the ground at low tables with a dozen of the natives.

Taban introduced everyone again, for which John was grateful; the only person he remembered from his first trip was Phutu, a little old man smaller than Teyla.

They exchanged greetings and sat down to eat. Phutu asked John about their walk through the jungle, looking altogether too guileless for an elder of a people in the Pegasus galaxy.

They talked about the climate and the food, John feigning a curiosity he really didn't feel while he tried to keep an eye on his people. Somehow they'd been maneuvered to sit apart from each other, each one engaged in conversation with a couple of Jaqui and not with each other. Were the Jaqui being polite, or trying to keep them off balance? Phutu's conversation hardly seemed geared towards gathering intel—but maybe they weren't trying to get anything out of the obviously military leader of the group. They'd have more luck with the civilians, wouldn't they?

Phutu was asking for news of Sheppard's people, and he trotted out the standard line about Atlantis being destroyed and having a new home. Phutu offered plenty of sympathy for their hardships.

"And yet you take the time to come help us!" the man said pleasantly. "It is very kind of you to assist!"

Sheppard shrugged. "We're hoping you can offer us something in return."

Phutu's smile didn't dim. "You know that our resources are humble, but we will surely see what we can do."

They went a few more rounds with vague talk, Phutu not specifying what they wanted or had to give, John not saying what Atlantis could use—mostly because he didn't think these people had anything they could use. If they did, they did a damned good job of hiding it, which did not bode well for a future alliance.

And he was getting really tired of the friendly-native shtick. 

"You do not trust us," Phutu said suddenly.

"I'll be honest," he said, because he had nothing to lose, and he wasn't going to say anything the other man didn't already know. "I don't know why you've allowed us to visit, since you haven't shown any interest in any kind of alliance or mutual aid until now. The teams we've had visit have always reported that you weren't surprised at any of our news; we know you have a few people going through the Gate, trading. We haven't been giving you much; you haven't been giving us anything."

Phutu merely raised his eyebrows.

"That makes us think you must be desperate to ask for our help this time. But this little luncheon doesn't show any signs of desperation; you're not rushing our doctor over there"—he nodded at Beckett, whose smiles to the people around him were belied by the tension in his shoulders as he made conversation at a nearby low table—"to look at critical patients. And I don't know if you have anything to offer us. The whole situation makes me nervous," he finished.

"That is why we made certain we allowed you to pick up your own cups and pour your own drinks from the pitchers," answered Phutu, the innocent smile never leaving his face. "We are nervous too. We do not normally allow people from other planets past the Ring of the Ancestors. No one from another world has been invited to our village in generations."

"Don't worry," Sheppard said with a grin that showed his teeth. "I'm not sure we could find this place again without help—I'd be hard pressed to find our way back to the Gate."

"But that one would not." Phutu tilted his head at Ronon a few places over. Ronon noticed the motion and looked steadily back. Phutu nodded at Ronon before returning his gaze to Sheppard. "We are being honest. We have not, of course, told you everything." 

The old man grinned as wide as he could—quite wide enough for Sheppard to realize something that should have struck him sooner. The man's teeth appeared to be in good shape. They were crooked, like he'd never had braces and could have used them, but they weren't rotten. He might be missing one, but only one. Damn. He already knew they were hiding things. Good dentistry wasn't threatening, but the things that went along with it often were.

"And you are not telling us everything," the old man continued. "We are not trying to cheat or harm you, but you will not know that until you have spent some time with us. The same on our side. Two years is a long time for either of us to lie in wait hoping for an opportunity to take advantage of the other. In the meantime, we have occasionally heard stories about you helping people. We now have more confidence in you. You, on the other hand, have probably heard no more news of us than you had before you came here?"

Sheppard nodded, curious where this was leading.

"So either," the man said with another big smile, "we are fantastically subtle and patient, or we are what we appear to be: a people neither hostile nor eager to ally with a people as formidable, and sometimes foolhardy, as yours."

He paused, apparently waiting for an answer. "Go on," John said. "I'm listening. I'm fascinated, in fact."

Phutu took another big swig of juice. "We could have captured or killed you at any time since you left the Ring. We could have stolen all that you carry, including your impressive weapons and the medical supplies we assume you have brought; we could have taken you hostage. We have not. We will not. And we sincerely hope that you will not rob us, kill us, find the raw materials you sought before and take them without treating our sick, or various other alternatives that I would consider were I a pessimist."

"Good thing you're not! A pessimist, I mean," Sheppard added. He didn't quite know how to answer this speech, which was doubtless how it was intended. It had certainly caught him off balance. It didn't shake his suspicions. What scans they had been able to complete on their first visit had not shown any raw materials of particular interest.

"You do not know me yet," Phutu said. "I hope over the next few days, we will come to understand each other a little better."

Sheppard wished Elizabeth had come on this mission. He was pretty good at reading people, had been for years, but she was a pro. She wouldn't be sitting here letting this old guy creep her out. Well, he wouldn't let the old guy creep him out either.

*****

Several Jaqui introduced themselves—too many for Carson to keep track, with their exotic-sounding names. They seemed thrilled to see him; he might have thought it was because he was a doctor and they must need help pretty badly to ask for it, but they seemed just as happy to talk to Rodney, despite Rodney sniffing all his food before eating it, calling out to Carson repeatedly to identify it, and making odd faces at it. 

He was grateful after lunch when one of their hosts reintroduced himself as Challa and took Carson to a hut to meet his patients. Teyla offered at once to help. While Teyla had good first-aid training and would certainly be Carson's choice from the team as an assistant, he'd been off-world enough to know that she wasn't really accompanying him as an aide, but rather to watch over him. They hardly knew these people at all.

He tried not to think that having someone with him had not prevented him from cocking things up completely on more than one occasion.

They walked past a handful of simple thatched huts, but the building they approached was larger and sturdier, and almost hidden in a thick grove of trees. It was the largest building Carson had seen on the planet. Carson wished they had had some information from one of their anthropologists at the briefing, but the colonel and the major had said that their teams never made it far from the Gate.

Challa introduced a woman roughly Carson's age as Kana, telling him she was the main healer at the hospital. Kana gave him a tour not of the hospital, which was mostly one room, but the patients.

Carson spent a long afternoon on a surprisingly routine batch of cases. He saw several minor infections and dispensed antibiotics. Kana and Challa eagerly questioned him about the drugs' actions and how they were made. Carson told them what he could, and then he asked after their medications. 

"Our medicines are much simpler than yours," Kana told him humbly. "I doubt you would be interested." Challa looked away; he seemed embarrassed.

"You'd be surprised," Carson answered. "Many of our medications are based on plants. We've learned to synthesize a number of them—to produce them more easily," he quickly substituted for listeners unused to manufacture, "but we're still finding new drugs in plants that have been around for centuries. People on my homeworld only recently discovered a compound in tree bark that may hold a new treatment for lung cancer."

The two Jaqui were electrified by news of the bark, interrupting each other to ask him what the tree was called. When they didn't recognize the name "lapacho," they asked him to describe the tree. He was sorry to say that he couldn't.

As he continued to work, Carson saw no medical emergencies, and he was amazed at the general good health of the patients he was treating. He saw no malnutrition, no serious birth defects, and no old, unhealed injuries. Why had they asked for a doctor at all?

*****

Taban said he was there to make sure they didn't get lost, but he must be keeping an eye on them. He wasn't preventing them from seeing anything or going anywhere, at least not yet; he was more tagging along. He tended to stick close to McKay, trying to see what Rodney was doing and asking questions about the scanner that Rodney answered impatiently at best, but Taban never interfered noticeably.

Nor did the two or three others whom John couldn't quite make out. He knew Ronon had seen them too, and at one point, Ronon flashed four fingers at him. Damn. Ronon had seen more than he had, and even trying, John couldn't manage to count four of the shadows flitting through the trees. He needed to be sharper than this.

Rodney had been scanning for various things. They'd gone south of the small settlement first, back under the taller jungle canopy, but that didn't produce more than trace readings of anything useful. Sheppard looked over his shoulder occasionally and saw that Rodney kept checking for power readings, radiation, and various kinds of chemicals; Sheppard hadn't even had to tell him to. McKay was as paranoid about the Genii as Sheppard himself, which was a good thing.

Rodney was being Rodney. It was too hot and humid. The mosquitoes bit Rodney worse than anyone else. The whole trip was a waste of time. The complaints wound on and on, John parrying them sometimes for fun—until Taban interrupted the fifteenth or sixteenth complaint about mosquitoes.

"It is said," he offered quietly, "that mosquitoes may be attracted to human breath. Perhaps if you focus on breathing through your nose...."

Sheppard burst out laughing. "He's telling you to shut up!"

A grin escaped Taban. "I would never say that!"

"Too polite," Ronon chipped in.

Rodney, of course, was not amused. "Oh, because what he said is much more polite than telling me to shut up!" 

"Rodney can't think without his mouth open," Sheppard said to Taban in a confiding tone. He liked this guy; not many people would trade words with Rodney this way, amused but not offended.

"Sometimes I do think aloud, Sheppard—as do you!" McKay waved the scanner towards Sheppard, "but most of the time, I think faster than I could possibly articulate."

"That's truly impressive!" said Taban. "For you speak so very fast!"

Rodney glared and opened his mouth, but Sheppard had to tell his new friend: "You haven't even really heard him get going yet!"

"Yeah," Ronon agreed. 

Rodney scowled and pointed the scanner at him like it was a weapon. How was this one John's fault? "We're not getting anything here. Look, do you have any clue where we might find naquada, or trinium? Oh, I don't know why I'm even bothering to ask! I mean, you people—"

"Rodney!" Sheppard interrupted.

"Perhaps we have different names for the substances you seek," Taban said happily, making John now certain that the man had realized that his cheerfulness irritated Rodney. "I think you will find better mineral deposits to the north of our village; the south has excellent soil, and if we went further southwest we would find some of our best growing areas, but I think the nutrients we use for growing things are not the ones that interest you."

"Why didn't you say something earlier?" Rodney snapped. He started to go 180° from the way he'd come. "No, wait...." He consulted his scanner.

"North is that way," Ronon said, pointing about 70° to Rodney's left.

"I was getting there! And don't tell me I didn't ask!" Rodney snapped, walking back past Taban and Sheppard. "We've only been walking this way for a eighty minutes already...." 

"Are you related to Phutu, by the way?" asked Sheppard, letting Rodney fade out. Ronon was with him; they could fall behind a little.

"Yes!" The small man beamed. "He is my grandfather! You see a resemblance?"

Not physically, no. Taban turned out to be one of the taller Jaqui; they seemed to average around five feet, and his grandfather must be a good four inches below that. Taban's brown skin seemed darker, and his hair held none of the gray that covered Phutu's head. But the quick smile and the quicker wit....

"Oh, definitely," John answered.

Almost two hours, and many mosquitoes, later, Rodney announced, "Increased levels of radiation. I wasn't sure for a while, but the readings are definitely showing an increase."

"Radiation?" Taban echoed.

And before John could stop him, Rodney was explaining radiation at top speed with a good dose of condescension thrown in. Damn! He'd wanted to see what Taban already knew; he wanted to hear what specifically Taban asked, but Rodney assumed he knew nothing and started with an explanation of solar radiation and was well on his way to hydrogen bombs before John managed to cut him off with a simple, "It can also be produced by certain kinds of weapons."

Taban frowned deeply, his first visible concern all day. "Is it dangerous to us?" 

"Not at these levels, no," Rodney said confidently. "I want to see if they get higher." He held the scanner in front of him, and John had a sudden image in his mind's eye of McKay with a dowsing rod. It would look much the same as the scanner did, he decided. Rodney had something of that same air of magic about him, too.

But damn, he didn't want to hear about radiation. He'd all but promised Beckett—and Weir—a safe mission. And Rodney and Ronon hadn't been back on their feet for that long.

*****

Two patients in the little hospital with malaria had been treated with the local medicine, the healers explained, and that worked for most patients—but it had not worked for these. Closer examination showed the disease and its treatment to be very similar to Earth's malaria, and the tree bark medication was roughly equivalent to quinine.

Carson had brought samples of many medications, including chloroquine, and he quickly prescribed some for the patients. It would have been better, however, if he'd known to prescribe some for his teammates in advance. He knew the place was tropical, and Rodney had mentioned mosquitoes; he should have thought of malaria sooner. Of course, Rodney had also mentioned "Montezuma's revenge," heat exhaustion, citrus, pirhanas, and Lyme disease, among others.

With a quick apology to the Jaqui, he took Teyla outside, gave her a dose and took one himself. "Preventive," he explained. "Malaria's treatable, but it can be quite nasty." 

She nodded and took the pill without complaint.

He handed her a small bottle with more. "Could you run around please, love, and make sure the others each take a dose? One pill each."

Teyla frowned, and Carson grimaced in reaction. "Right. You're not to leave me alone." He radioed the team before she could explain, which she no doubt would have done quite gracefully. "Have you all been seeing mosquitoes?" he asked.

"Oh, God, yes!" Rodney didn't need to identify himself over the comm. No question was rhetorical when Rodney was involved. "They love me! I've already got—" 

Carson cut him off gently and told them to come to the hospital for a preventive dose of chloroquine.

"Preventive?" Rodney sounded anxious. "What if I've already got malaria?"

"Then the drug will treat it, Rodney."

"Right. We'll be there in—how far is it to where the Carson is?" he asked someone obviously not on the radio. 

Sheppard came on the radio. "About twenty-five minutes, Doc," he said more calmly.

As soon as he signed off, Teyla was apologizing for refusing to leave. "It is safest for everyone that we go nowhere alone."

Carson held up a hand. "I know," he said, but he didn't really believe it. He knew that she was looking out for him; if these people did turn out to be concealing something, protecting the CMO would be a priority. They should have brought one of the other doctors. Not just to protect him, but to protect themselves. He didn't exactly have a great record at handling crises outside Atlantis.

He feared Teyla was there largely to prevent a repeat of the Lucius incident. That really wasn't his fault; he wasn't to know the man had that pheromone! Anyone with Carson, or anyone in his place, would probably have been affected just as badly. But Carson had been affected first—and he'd brought Lucius back with him, to Atlantis, breaking all protocols. A colossal blunder. Knowing that others had been badly affected by Lucius's herb didn't make him feel much better.

Carson went back in and had nearly finished with the patients before him when he heard Rodney's voice, expounding on a topic Carson really didn't want to hear.

Carson pulled his medical scanner out of a pocket and stepped out of the hut. He was scanning Rodney before the men came to a full halt. 

"What are you doing?" Rodney asked after he took the pill Teyla handed him with a big gulp of water.

"I heard you say radiation—"

"Oh, it's hardly more than background radiation! Believe me, if I thought it was anything to worry about, I'd have been here a lot sooner!"

That was doubtless true. Rodney was sometimes irritating, but he was better than these macho military men who could be about to lose a limb and not say anything. 

After everyone had been dosed, Carson and Teyla returned to the patients. The healers had very little to show him that they had not already shown him. One patient had an unexplained rash; Carson finally gave her some allergy medication but couldn't make any promises.

He was struck by both how new and how minor the medical problems seemed to be. "How many people do you have in your settlement?" he finally asked. 

Challa looked away, and Kana hesitated.

"I just wondered," Carson hastened to explain. "I mean, you don't seem to have a lot of sick people here. I know you assured the team who came here a few days ago that you weren't facing any serious contagions, but I thought you'd have more patients for me."

Kana answered. "Yes, we are fortunate to be a fairly healthy people. We do, however, have a few difficult cases...."

The two Jaqui looked at each other, and Carson wondered what they were getting into now.

Kana obviously sensed his unease. "You must forgive us," she said. "We do not welcome visitors often. We are reluctant to give up information about ourselves, especially information that would be valuable to the Wraith."

"The Wraith surely have better ways of figuring out how many people you have here than asking us!" Carson blurted before he thought it through. "I do understand your hesitation, however. We don't tell everyone all about ourselves, either."

"You have already done much to earn our trust. And these other patients are some distance away. I think tomorrow will be time enough to see them," the healer said mildly. 

A test. Carson had spent the afternoon passing a test. He should have realized. He thought they were watching his every move to learn from him, but they were watching to see if he was any good, like a first-year resident. He felt a surge of anger, but he tried not to let it show.

Kana smiled an apology anyway. "Challa, why don't you ask if our guests can see our beach?" Kana suggested, and the man took off at an easy run, as if he were eager to be out of the hut. "The evening meal will be soon."

*****

"We can't walk far enough fast enough to learn anything significant!" Rodney finally broke off muttering to himself to shout to the others. "I really need a Jumper!"

"What is a Jumper?" asked Taban.

Sheppard stepped in before Rodney could give another excessively helpful explanation. "It's a kind of ship," he said, waiting to see if the man understood, or asked what use a ship would be on dry land, or simply didn't know what a ship was; they were, after all, in the middle of the jungle.

Taban seemed genuinely puzzled for just a moment and then said, "An airship? Like the Wraith have?" A mix of curiosity and dread tinged his voice.

"Yes, but not...." Rodney broke off. "Much better! We don't normally use it to attack people," he said. "And we can't beam people off—and we wouldn't be taking people anyway—oh, forget it...." He looked at Sheppard.

"It's okay, Rodney. I'm sure word of the Jumpers has gotten out," he answered, keeping most of his attention on Taban.

"I did not know that you have airships like the Wraith," Taban said. "My grandfather might. He hears all the news."

Ronon stood silently, arms folded, watching Taban as intently as Sheppard did—and more obviously. Sheppard had little doubt Phutu knew about the Jumpers.

"So can we ask him if we can bring a Jumper?" Rodney asked after a moment.

Taban nodded slowly. "He might say no," he answered, "but you can ask."

Sheppard did, asking the old man himself when they got back to the village. He was still sitting in the pavilion where they'd had lunch, talking with others who went away when Taban led the group in purposefully.

"No," Phutu answered slowly. "We do not want such things on our planet." The old man frowned, though, when Rodney told him of the radiation, and he asked, "It is not dangerous, is it?"

"Not the levels I'm reading so far, but it definitely increases farther from the settlement."

"So at some distance it may become dangerous?"

"Yes! That's why I need a Jumper!" Rodney said, waving around the scanner he still held. "I mean, I hope it's safe, but in a Jumper, I could take readings, see if it's nearing harmful levels—and tell your people to stay outside the area."

"North of here?" Phutu turned to Taban.

"North north-east," Taban confirmed. 

Phutu professed ignorance, but the smile returned to his face soon, and Sheppard wasn't convinced that news of the radiation came as a surprise to him.

Rodney's lecture on radiation neither horrified nor impressed Taban, nor Phutu, when he repeated it. Was that because they had grown up fearing a race whose technology included energy guns, flying ships, and a transporter, so that horrific weapons came as no surprise even when he didn't understand them? Or because they knew more about radiation than they let on?

Taban and Phutu had fallen silent. 

"Perhaps this decision should not be taken by one alone," the old man said, raising his hands in a sort of shrug. "Let me confer with the others about your Jumper. I trust tomorrow will be time enough for an answer?" 

Rodney huffed impatiently, but Sheppard agreed, and Taban was directed to entertain their guests. He hardly had to, as the others called to say they were going to see a beach. Taban led the way.

*****

"Beach? I thought we were in the middle of a bloody jungle!" Carson exclaimed. 

Kana gave him a brilliant smile. "Our village is in the forest, not the jungle. And the beach is...one of our treasures. We do not share it lightly."

Carson tried to ask more about the patients, but Kana put him off.

"I am uncertain what to tell you. These are more...difficult cases, perhaps, than the ones you saw today. But tomorrow will be time enough. You have worked hard today."

It was hard not to feel that she was condescending to him. He wouldn't call it a hard day's work at all, even if he hadn't appreciated the long hike.

The beach turned out to be only a few minutes' walk away. When Challa confirmed that permission had been granted—Carson wasn't sure by whom—Kana walked with them until they could see a wall of rock rising beyond the trees. Sheppard gave them permission to go on ahead, but he and the others would follow.

"I should return," Kana said. "Our people are not used to guests; as you can imagine, some of our patients are very nervous...."

Carson nodded. "About being treated by a doctor from another planet."

She smiled, "But I wanted to be the one to show you our seashore."

Kana led them to a break in the cliffs that suddenly appeared beyond the trees. Carson and Teyla both stopped, amazed at the expanse of sand they could see beyond the narrow passage. "The birds are friendly," Kana told them as they finished coming through, pointing to some black bodies lining the shore. "You can walk right up to them, as long as you do not startled them; they do bite if they feel threatened." Then she apologized again for having to leave and disappeared back through the cliff, promising to be certain the rest of the team after them; "I am sure they will enjoy the beach too." She gave them a proud smile.as they gawked.

Carson saw plenty of water every day, but he hadn't seen a beach like this in ages. They stepped onto the sand. "I can't believe all this time they had a perfectly good landing site that they never told us about! I mean, we could have taken a Jumper and just walked fifteen bloody minutes to the village instead of over ninety!"

Teyla sighed. "I would have preferred a shorter walk as well." She gave him a pointed look.

Carson grimaced. "Sorry about that. My mouth runs away with me occasionally."

Her burst of laughter startled him. Teyla put her hand to her mouth. "I am sorry. That was—"

Carson had to laugh himself. "That was totally justified, I suppose."

Instead of agreeing, Teyla replied, "It is good to have Doctor McKay with us on missions again."

Rodney had only been back with them for a couple of brief missions since Sheppard's bullet had confined him to Atlantis for weeks.

Carson shivered in the heat. His friends had one close call after another. If Rodney or Ronon had been more seriously injured—or if Sheppard hadn't managed to find Carson in time.... Carson had taken Kagan and run, thinking Rodney was trying to interfere with the treatment of his surviving patient. Once he'd come to himself, when Rodney had shut the damned machine off, he knew Rodney had only been helping. But by then he couldn't find his way back without help. Thank God Sheppard had found hims quickly. Things could have been far worse, and they were bad enough as it was.

"Rodney and Ronon are right as rain," he said reassuringly. And Barroso's death wasn't just his fault, but a combination of Wraith malice and Genii weaponry.

Teyla looked at him suddenly. "And you?"

Carson nodded cautiously. "It was hell," he said simply. "But it's over." He shrugged at her continued scrutiny. "Colonel Sheppard?" he asked, knowing Teyla had more opportunities to observe the man than he had.

"He does not speak of it," Teyla answered with what might have been a sigh, and Carson wasn't sure if it was at the colonel, or at the view before them.

They had left the shelter of the cliffs, and before them stretched a white sand beach. Cliffs cut it off to their right and to their left, making the sparkling surface all the more astonishing. Beyond the beach was an expanse of blue water that shaded eventually into sky; he wasn't even certain where one ended and the other began. The area by the water was teeming with large birds.

Carson finally said, in hushed tones, "I don't know whether to be furious with them for not telling us so that we could come in a Jumper, or glad we're not getting a chance to ruin the area."

Teyla looked at him quizzically.

"On Earth," he explained, "we've ruined tens of thousands of kilometers of shoreline by building on it, polluting, making artificial reefs and seawalls...."

Teyla looked back at the beach, nodding. "I for one am glad they have preserved it. It is worth the walk; do you not agree?"

Carson was surprised to find that he did. Maybe later he could take off his boots. He'd really like to feel the sand between his toes. Some distance out he could make out a couple of figures—surfing?

A few steps later, he focused on the birds. "Oh, look at them! Is that—my God!" he gasped. "I've never seen one up close!"

"What are they?" Teyla asked.

"Penguins! They live in the Antarctic—where the Ancient base was, on Earth, but they didn't come near the base. I saw some from helicopters, but they were far away. Here we can walk right up to them!"

The queer thing was that the closer they got, the bigger the birds looked; they weren't as far away as Carson had thought. He had seen them at zoos and on television. He didn't remember them being so big. 

"And what is special about these birds?" Teyla looked quizzically down the beach as she walked.

"Oh, I don't know. I suppose it's that they're so rare, at least for most of us. They only live near the south pole on Earth. And they look, well, cute. They look like they're in formal dress." He thought of trying to explain tuxedos to Teyla and decided to give it a miss. 

These were awfully big penguins. They were still some distance away, but they looked like the biggest penguins he had ever seen. And those beaks looked abnormally long. The birds had seen the newcomers, and several were waddling in their direction quite fast.

"They don't really look quite like Earth penguins, though." He slowed down, and Teyla slowed with him. "They look...bigger."

"Did you not say that you had never been close to a penguin?"

"Well, I've seen them in exhibits too. I'm sure they weren't...." He stopped dead as two of the penguins came quite close. "They weren't this big," Carson said, taking a step backwards, and then another.

"But Kana said they are harmless! They seem friendly!" Teyla smiled at him and turned back to the penguins.

Carson felt torn between not wanting to look stupid in front of Teyla and wanting to bolt all the way back up the beach. Those birds must be well over four feet tall! Teyla was a warrior. Carson was a doctor. No one should think badly of him if he wasn't eager to meet with large new...waterfowl.

"Oh, my God," Carson breathed. 

The closer penguin was coming very near Teyla indeed, and it looked to be nearly her height. The beak had to be a foot long, and it looked sharper than Carson could remember penguins' beaks looking. Not that he ever paid that much attention to penguins.

Carson took a few more steps backwards. Teyla looked back at him and laughed. "They are just birds, Doctor!" she said.

And that beak was aimed right for Teyla's neck—Carson took a few steps forward again as the lead penguin came to a halt a little in front of Teyla, unsure he could do anything to protect her, but not wanting to be too far away if the thing did attack.

"Good Lord!" Carson breathed. "Earth penguins aren't this big. I'm sure of it!"

Teyla laughed again softly, obviously not wanting to frighten their new friends. The second penguin joined the first. Carson came slowly and cautiously forward to stand next to—well, just a little behind—Teyla.

"They are handsome birds," Teyla breathed.

"Aye," Carson had to agree. "But they're...."

"They are indeed quite large." 

Carson looked around and realized that now rather a lot of penguins seemed to be converging on their position. "You might want to step back, love," he told her, tapping her arm gently.

"They are just being friendly." She stepped forward instead.

Carson gritted his teeth. He was surrounded by birds with beaks that looked very sharp indeed, and they could certainly reach his jugular. The tallest seemed to be about Teyla's height. But if she wasn't afraid, he wasn't, he told himself.

"You do not need to prove yourself to me," Teyla chuckled.

"That obvious?" Carson asked in dismay.

"Many of your people seem to be afraid of animals." Teyla was still amused.

"Have you ever seen anyone kicked by a horse?" Carson asked. "I have. And I've seen someone whose horse landed on her." He shook his head at the memory. "She was lucky to live. She had internal injuries." 

Teyla looked surprised. "I thought your horses were domesticated." 

Carson nodded. The surprising thing, really, wasn't what Teyla didn't know about Earth; it was how much she had picked up from her friends on Atlantis. "Most of them are, and that's why people can ride them. But if an animal that large lashes out, even if it doesn't mean to hurt, it can injure quite badly. And if one lands on you—imagine a creature that weighs four or five times what Ronon weighs, dear."

"These seem harmless," Teyla said, but she did not advance further.

"As long as they don't fall on you, yes." Carson tried to relax. "Still, it might be best not to touch. Did Kana say they bite?"

The humans and the birds stared at each other in silence for a few minutes. The birds seemed to be looking for something. Food? Very odd. He found himself relaxing as the birds lost interest and began to drift away.

"They are wondrous," Teyla said with a sigh. "We should show the others!"

As they walked back up the beach to the narrow break in the rocks, the germ of an idea formed in Carson's mind. A rather wicked idea. It really wasn't fair. He'd already been difficult with Colonel Sheppard. Of course, Rodney had been difficult for everyone. 

Teyla said, "You were so surprised at the size of the birds; we should warn...." Carson could hear the moment when Teyla had the same idea. He felt guilty. It wasn't fair. But it would be bloody funny to see Rodney as taken aback as he was.

A few minutes later, Carson and Teyla were back on the outskirts of the settlement.

"Now we must make sure Colonel Sheppard doesn't arrive before Rodney does, and Ronon—well, it would be better if he weren't even here. He tends to take the lead," Carson said in a low voice to Teyla, not sure how far their teammates were. "If you can find a way to make sure he brings up the rear instead...."

Teyla swallowed a giggle. "It seems wrong of you to do this to your...partner in crime?"

Carson looked at her sharply.

"You knew perfectly well what John meant about wines," she said, trying to sound stern. "Both of you. I heard you afterwards."

"Blast!" He had been sure no one was around when he and Rodney snickered about the Napa Valley exchange after lunch, while John and Ronon were still talking with the leader and Carson was waiting for Challa. He couldn't remember where Teyla had been, and obviously she had been too close.

Teyla smiled. "The colonel, however, did not hear you. Nor will I tell him that Rodney is planning to insult California wines until he smuggles some to Atlantis for him—and you."

Carson smiled back. "We'd be most grateful."

"You will share your wine with me," Teyla ordered. "I would like to taste some as well."

"I think that can be arranged." 

They schooled their faces. Moments later, they could see the rest of the team approaching, Sheppard and Rodney arguing.

"Oh, Rodney?" Carson sang out. "You really must see the beach here!"

Rodney called back, "Oh, thank God! Carson, tell me you've found something really worth seeing. I mean, we see water every day."

Sheppard swatted his arm—too much information. Carson had to watch himself constantly not to refer to Atlantis in front of people, although their occupation of the city had probably become an open secret again. Especially since he'd brought Lucius there.

"We have," Carson said. Teyla nodded, not too vigorously, as they walked up.

"We have found birds," she told them. "I believe you call them penguins."

"Penguins? Huh. I'd have thought it's too hot," Rodney replied. 

John smiled, clearly also welcoming a break. "You know, I think they have penguins in New Zealand. And South Africa. But here? The real thing?"

"Well," said Carson, shaking his head a little, "not exactly the same. The beak looks a bit different to me. But I'm no expert."

"I've never seen penguins up close," Rodney said.

"That is almost exactly what Doctor Beckett said," Teyla told him with a straight face. "He said you had seen some in...Antarctica? But from some distance."

"From a helicopter," Carson agreed.

"You looked down? I thought you had your eyes closed the whole time." Rodney smirked at Carson. 

What little compunction Carson might have had about this trick evaporated. "Maybe the first time," Carson told him.

Rodney continued to tease, and Carson grumbled back while he and Teyla led the way through the rocks. Ronon, fortunately, took the rear of his own accord, watching around them constantly.

Carson was quite startled to emerge through the break and find two penguins barely five meters away; they must have followed him and Teyla when they left. He stopped dead while Teyla took a few more steps around him. 

Rodney's scream and John's "holy shit!" came out at the same time. The birds froze and raised their wings. Was that a defensive posture? 

Carson took a step back. Then he turned around. Rodney had disappeared, and Sheppard had his weapon raised.

"Rodney?" Carson took a couple of steps to find Rodney flattened up against the rocks, obviously hiding from the birds. He could feel his mouth breaking into a grin but couldn't quite stop it.

Ronon burst past them, gun aimed at the beach. The penguins started back warily. These birds weren't dumb, Carson thought.

"Heard McKay scream," Ronon explained. "Everyone okay?"

"It was not a scream!" Rodney hollered. The birds froze. "It was a yell, just like yours!" 

"A very piercing yell," Sheppard said, sticking a finger in his ear. He pulled out the finger and examined it.

"Eew!" Rodney looked at the Colonel with great disgust. 

Ronon lowered his weapon.

"Colonel, I don't think that's even the ear that you had towards Rodney when he...yelled," Carson told him, winning glares from Rodney and Sheppard. 

"You did that on purpose!" Rodney stabbed an accusing finger into Carson's chest. "You knew I would—yell!" 

"Settle down," Sheppard said. He lowered the weapon he'd brought up at once; the birds seemed to be calmer. More were heading their way. Curious about the noise? Defensive? Carson couldn't tell. He didn't know much about birds.

"They are harmless." Teyla smiled innocently.

"I don't know about harmless," Sheppard muttered.

Carson was a little surprised John wasn't ribbing Rodney unmercifully, but the colonel seemed more interested in the birds.

Examining them, the pilot said, "Just like—you know, they just found the bones of these things on Earth? In Peru, I think. I wonder if the Ancients—"

"What are you talking about?" Rodney had gotten curious enough to peel himself off the rocks, but he kept Carson between him and the birds.

"They found bones of very large penguins in Peru," Sheppard said slowly. "And they had really long beaks. Forty million years old, I think they said."

"How come I never heard about this?" Rodney looked miffed.

"Do you read the news in the databursts?"

"I don't have time for that! I can't even keep up with the journals! Of course, half the stuff in the journals now, we're disproving, but I can't publish...."

Sheppard added over Rodney's words, "Yeah, they found these remains in the last few months, I think. I just read about it in the latest burst from the SGC."

"I'm going to kill you," Rodney hissed to Carson as he stepped past, "in your sleep." Then he approached a penguin cautiously, staying just out of beak range. 

The penguins were soon nearly surrounding them. Ronon towered over the birds, but once he lowered his weapon, they waddled over to him, too. Were they smelling the humans? 

John reached out and touched one as Rodney nervously told him, "Those beaks look really scary, Colonel."

John gently rubbed a...shoulder? "Oily," he said, wiping his hands on his trousers. 

"Well, yeah; they need to keep body heat in the water," Rodney suggested.

The colonel grinned and indicated the water with his chin. "Look at those waves. Man, I gotta catch some of that." He pointed at a couple of people a little way down the beach with what seemed to be surf boards. "Trouble with the city is, no surf!" He spoke quietly.

Rodney huffed. "You know, Sheppard, we have limited time on this planet, and I for one am finding the radiation readings—"

"Now that Teyla and Carson are done, maybe they can help you?" Sheppard started working his way through the penguins in the direction of the surfers.

"Oh, we're hardly done!" Carson replied. "I'll have to see how my patients—I mean, the patients I saw today—are getting on with our drugs. We've been very lucky so far, not seeing adverse reactions in the peoples of the Pegasus—"

Rodney waved a hand dismissively, not even bothering to turn to Carson. "Not interested in medical details," he said flatly. Then he suddenly did turn. "Unless you've seen anyone with, say, radiation poisoning?" 

Carson frowned. "You were insisting the levels weren't dangerous!"

"Yeah, well, they don't look dangerous, but there may be higher levels in some locations." 

"Does Colonel Sheppard know—"

"That we could be looking at another Genii? Of course!" Rodney interrupted Teyla's question, but he spoke in a low tone. 

"They said dinner would be soon," Rodney said. "Can we just leave Sheppard?" The colonel had nearly reached the surfers. "He's not gonna do that in what he's wearing now, is he?" Before anyone could answer, he returned to his previous topic. "I'm less convinced the radiation is background now. It seemed to get stronger north of the village. 

"I wish I'd had my scanner out our whole way in. Sheppard says we'll do more tomorrow—assuming we're staying." Rodney looked around suspiciously. "You know, though, if they're concealing advanced technology, they could be listening in on us at any time."

"Yeah. Maybe the birds are bugged," Ronon said with a grin.

Rodney glared at the one penguin which lingered nearby. "Move along, move along!" He flapped his hands at the bird. The bird stepped closer to see what he was doing. "No, no!" He made pushing gestures with his hands. The penguin stared at him.

Carson sighed. "Do we need to be wearing dosimeters?"

"No." Rodney left off glaring at the penguin for the moment. "The amounts are still pretty low. The scanner's sufficient to tell us if we're entering a dangerous area—and believe me, you'll be the second one to know if that happens. I'm trying to get them to let me bring a Jumper through."

The last penguin studying them gave up and waddled back towards the water.

"What levels are we talking about?" Carson asked. Rodney could be incredibly concerned about the most minor health matters and blithely disregard serious ones. Worse, because Rodney knew at some level that he was a hypochondriac, he would brush off Carson's concerns by saying that if he wasn't worried, no one should be. He was the most frustrating patient Carson had ever had, and on this expedition, that was saying something.

"Oh, far less than we were exposed to when we flew a Jumper into the coronasphere of a sun!"

"But increasing as you go in a particular direction?" 

"Well, slightly, but we're talking small amounts. I mean, I checked my notes from our first visit before we came back, and my first readings when we came here a few years ago were about 7 millisieverts, near the Gate. Higher background radiation than we'd find on Earth, but nothing really to worry about. But I started readings again at the village, and they were definitely higher—over ten millisieverts. And when Sheppard decided we needed to go back, we were at about 31."

"That's a huge increase!" Carson exclaimed. "That can't be natural."

"No," Rodney said bluntly. "If we'd changed elevations significantly I might believe it, but it's such a short distance, I find it hard to believe even naturally occurring uranium could account for it."

"Are we in danger?" Teyla asked. She and Ronon were both frowning, and Carson realized they probably didn't have enough information to follow the whole conversation.

Rodney sighed audibly.

"Not from the radiation, no," Carson answered before Rodney could say something unkind. "At least, not unless we suddenly get a lot closer—"

"—like entering a bunker or having nuclear weapons used on us," Rodney put in.

"No," Carson said with a glare. "What's more disturbing is that they're obviously keeping something from us. They aren't the simple, untechnological people they're pretending to be."

Teyla was still frowning. "Perhaps it is a misunderstanding. When my people and your people first me, you thought we were 'backwards,'" she said, the last aimed at Rodney. She crossed her arms. She doubtless still remembered Rodney's ill-advised words in the briefing yesterday.

"You are backwards," Rodney said, rushing in where angels feared to tread. "You have some technology, but—"

"But you thought we had none because of the lives we lead." Teyla's tone was fairly neutral, but Carson was glad not to be in Rodney's shoes right now.

Ronon nodded down the beach. "Sheppard's coming back. Maybe we should wait for him?"

Carson turned to look. The colonel wasn't far. "You have just enough time to apologize to Teyla for calling her people backwards, Rodney," he said with a smile.

"Hey, I—" Teyla was glaring at Rodney. "I mean, by our standards—"

"By the Ancestors' standards, you are backwards," Teyla told him.

"Oh. Um, actually, you have a point. Although our standards sometimes involve a few more safety protocols and warnings and manuals—"

"Colonel," said Carson with relief. Teyla had received as much of an apology from Rodney as she was going to get. "We've been discussing Rodney's radiation readings."

"Oh. Good." Sheppard grinned. "So everyone's on the same page now?"

Rodney rolled his eyes. "No, everyone is not even in the same book."

"Yes," Carson answered.

"Good," John repeated. "So I figure we stay overnight as planned, you finish up tomorrow, if that's all right?" Carson nodded. Colonel Sheppard really did seem to want his opinion, despite all his blunders in recent months, and he greatly appreciated that. "We'll poke around some more and see if we can get a better idea of what we're dealing with. But if anything goes sideways, we're outta here."

"Okay! Let's get dinner, then!" Rodney smiled and turned.

"And tomorrow morning, before we do the readings, I'm going surfing!" Sheppard announced triumphantly as they started back .

Dinner was another group affair under the big pavilion, but Rodney hissed in Carson's ear as they entered that they'd seen a lot more huts on his long walk than the people here could represent. "They're not showing us how many people they've got!" 

"Would you?" Carson asked in an undertone.

Kana appeared and asked Carson to sit with her and Challa, and soon the rest of the group seemed to have companions as well. They weren't divided by any great distance, but they had no real opportunity to talk to each other.

Several dishes were passed from person to person, and every time another one started around, Rodney would call over, "Carson! Citrus?" and hold up the bowl.

He really needed to finish programming the portable scanners to detect citrus. It wasn't fair to Rodney (not that Rodney was fair to the medical staff). He'd managed to get one of the scanners in the infirmary to recognize the allergen, and all new foods were tested there before being sent to Atlantis's kitchen, but he'd really meant to rig something that Rodney could just take with him. He should enlist Rodney's own help to get it done.

As it was, his conversations with Kana and Challa were punctuated by shouting back and forth--mostly "no," but on one item, he had to say, "Don't know; safer not to"—and Rodney pushed the bowl away with such speed it nearly ended up in some poor woman's lap. 

He could understand the healers' eagerness to learn new treatments, especially natural ones involving flora perhaps present on their planet, but he did wonder about other possible motives. "Perhaps you've picked my brain enough now that I might have a go at yours?" he asked with a smile.

Challa looked horrified.

"It's an expression," he explained quickly.

Kana patted Challa's arm gently and laughed. "I don't know that we have much to teach you, but...."

"Oh, but you seem to have so few patients! How do you keep your people in general so healthy? I don't see any mosquito netting, for instance; why do so few have malaria?"

Challa answered that question eagerly. "When the mosquitoes are bad, we go in our huts before sunset." Right now, it looked like they had an hour or so before sunset still. "The leaves that cover the doors do a fine job of keeping mosquitoes out! Right now, the torches burning around the edges of our pavilion give off a scent that draws the mosquitoes—and burns them. We do not lose enough to upset the natural balance, but they do not bite us." Carson was amazed. He'd noticed an odd scent as they'd lit the torches, but he'd thought nothing of it. "And some lotions help to keep the mosquitoes away from the body, but they are...unpleasant."

"They stink," Kana said bluntly. "The most effective involves concentrated urine from the jamachi you saw on the beach."

"Oh, the penguins?" Carson smiled. "We have birds like that on my world. They're a lot smaller, though. We were pretty surprised when we found out how big these fellas were."

"Some are bigger than Kana!" Challa grinned. Kana gave him a look that would peel paint. He didn't notice.

"And they come right up to you!" 

Challa's grin was replaced by a look of astonishment. "They—even you? I didn't realize they would do that to strangers."

Kana didn't seem surprised, however. "They are friendly creatures. I doubt they notice the difference between you and us." She ate another bite and then seemed to think of something. "They didn't bother you, did they? They can bite, if one annoys them."

Carson shuddered theatrically, hoping it hid his actual fear of the huge birds. "With those beaks?"

Challa laughed. "It just leaves a bruise." 

Kana tilted her head towards Challa. "It's quite survivable. He's living proof. Always playing with them when he was young." She leaned towards Carson and whispered, "Still does."

Now Challa looked annoyed.

The dynamic between the two of them suddenly seemed familiar. "Are you two related?" he asked before stopping to wonder whether might be a rude question.

Kana laughed and then pretended to look horrified. "You can tell? I had hoped not! Yes, he's my young cousin."

Challa rolled his eyes when she said "young cousin." "Did you ever think maybe I would prefer not to be judged always as your relation? Your younger relation?" He seemed genuinely miffed, though he remained polite.

Kana's eyebrows went up and down quickly. She bent towards her food a little.

Carson felt awkward. "So how much harm does the birds' bite do?" 

Challa proudly extended an arm over the table for Carson to examine. "That's the worst bite anyone has ever gotten, isn't it, Kana?" A faint scar remained on his forearm. It didn't look bad.

"It wouldn't have scarred if you hadn't hidden it from us," Kana replied. "They don't usually scar," she told Carson earnestly. "Adults are virtually never bitten. It's children who make them angry; they don't know when to leave them alone. The jamachi have very even tempers." She smiled at her cousin.

Rodney was just close enough to be listening in to their conversation, it turned out. "Yeah. Hey, do you cook them?"

All the Jaqui around them turned towards Rodney. 

"To eat? I mean, there's gotta be a lot of meat...."

Even a man with the social skills of Rodney McKay could realize the looks he was getting were changing from baffled to horrified.

"Um, maybe I shouldn't have said that. See, uh—help me out here, Carson."

Challa seemed as eager to help Rodney out as anyone. "We eat fish. We eat many plants. But we do not each jamachi!"

"Huh. Religious prohibition?"

Kana seized on Rodney's words at once. "Yes," she said with relief. "I think it would be...an abuse of the Mother's gifts to eat such magnificent creatures. We only eat lower lifeforms. Much lower lifeforms," she said with finality.

Carson was happy to move to a different topic. "If I might ask, could you tell me a bit about your religion? We've encountered a number of different beliefs...on our travels."

Kana was happy to oblige, and soon Carson had more information than he knew what to do with. He wished one of the anthropologists were here. He was sure he wouldn't remember it all. He thought of Daniel Jackson, eagerly telling him more than he ever thought he needed to know about the Ancients. He wished Doctor Jackson were here now. And not only because he had discovered over the past three years that they needed to know a lot more about the Ancients than they actually did. 

Daniel Jackson would no doubt have followed the conversation much more easily. Kana kept referring to the Mother, the Father, and sometimes the Mother-Father, until Carson had to ask for clarification. Their concept seemed something like the Christian Trinity, but with two instead of three. He wasn't familiar enough with other religions to work out any better analogy. They believed their planet had been given into their care, and they had to be good guardians, living in harmony with the rest of Creation. That sounded vaguely Buddhist. She went on to elaborate on how her vocation as a healer played a part in the greater scheme of things.

Kana spoke with warmth and intensity, and Carson found that even though he couldn't follow everything she said, he could see the sincerity of her convictions. Challa was smiling as if he had heard it all before and wasn't convinced, or at least he did not believe as fervently. Rodney was listening, and Carson could tell that he was holding his tongue. He'd have to thank Rodney later, let him know that his efforts had been noticed and appreciated. He was surprised that Rodney was even paying attention.

"And you? What do you believe?"

The sudden question startled Carson. He'd been quite happy listening. "Well, where I come from we have many different beliefs," he hedged.

"Tell them about Christianity, Carson," Rodney called over. At first Carson thought it was just to give Rodney more ammunition; he'd learned even before he left Earth never to discuss religion with the man. But Rodney seemed genuinely interested in the conversation, or at least he wasn't being obvious about his disdain for once.

"I'm no expert," Carson protested, but then he found himself laying out the basic points of the faith. He felt a little guilty, since he wasn't particularly religious and had his own doubts, but Kana was very curious and kept asking questions, and sometimes offer comparisons to her own faith. He didn't know the answers to some of her queries.

At last Kana touched his arm. "Thank you," she said. "That is truly fascinating. But I fear I'm keeping you from eating, and we must finish soon; the sun will be setting very soon." 

Carson finished the food on the simple wooden plate before him. "Lovely," he said. "Best meal I've had in...a while." 

"Challa will show you to where you can sleep. We thought you might all want to be together, so we've arranged one hut. Your leader approved it."

The 'hut' was a little more sophisticated than Carson expected. The door was covered by a curtain of large leaves woven together. Five hammocks were strung in a circle, with one end at the wall and the other around the same central column that held up the ceiling of the main room. Another curtain of leaves led off the main room. The large room was lit by three small lanterns hanging on the wall.

Challa showed them how to lift the translucent covers off the lanterns when they wanted to blow them out. They were oil lamps.

"Oh, look! A potty!" Rodney had pushed aside one of the curtains. "It's a...pot," he said with some annoyance. "Like that one we had to use before."

"Hey, at least we don't have to dig a hole in the ground," the colonel said absently, inspecting the light blankets on each of the hammocks. "Nice," he said.

Challa explained the use of the pot before he left, an explanation they'd each received earlier in the day ("as if we could hold it all day," Rodney said) when toilets were needed.

"Wonder if this came from those alpacas?" the Colonel was now patting one of the blankets himself.

"They have alpacas?" Carson asked. "Wait—what exactly is an alpaca? It's like a llama, isn't it?"

"It's more like a sheep with a really long neck," Rodney answered. Then he smirked. "We'll have to arrange for you to meet one of them."

Carson sighed. "I'm not Welsh, Rodney."

Even in the dim light, Carson could see confusion on Rodney's face. He hadn't been listening the last time Carson had said this either. "Sheep jokes usually involve the Welsh, Rodney. It would be like making redneck American jokes about Canadians."

Sheppard stage-whispered, "Doc, I think the Canadians have rednecks too."

Rodney glared at Sheppard briefly before returning to Carson. "Now you're telling me which ethnic groups to mock? Are doctors allowed to do that?"

"Only when you get it wrong!"

Sheppard ended the discussion by pulling off his boots, hopping into the hammock farthest from the loo, and asking, "So. What do we think?"

"Hey! I wanted that hammock!" McKay immediately headed to the other side of the room, and before Carson knew it, everyone had claimed a hammock, leaving him with the one nearest the toilet. Some noise came from the roof: it had begun to rain.

"I should know better than to travel with this team," Carson muttered. He sat on the last empty hammock and began untying his boots. 

"Hey!" said Rodney. "We're the best team on Atlantis! We—"

"Have the highest number of infirmary visits. Have the highest rate of infirmary visits per mission." Carson had figured the statistics for moments just such as these. "Have the highest rate of medical problems after leaving the infirmary." He didn't say out loud, "highest rate of medical personnel who want to do them further bodily harm."

"Whose fault is that?" Rodney shot back. "It's not our fault if you quacks release us too soon."

"I didn't say 'after being released from the infirmary,' I said 'after leaving the infirmary.' That includes times one of you failed to mention a problem while in the infirmary as well as times you left against medical advice and times you were released but failed to follow instructions!"

"Ooh. Let's get back to the matter at hand." At least Colonel Sheppard had some sense. If only he exercised it more when he was actually a patient! "So what's going on here?"

Rodney immediately answered, "Well, they say they have no advanced technology, but Mister Geiger Counter begs to differ. They have a religion, but they're not at all surprised to hear about other beliefs, and they're even curious about other beliefs; now that's something you don't see every day. Even if they do still think some divine being is personally concerned with their individual welfare but, shockingly, never intervenes when the Wraith come around." That was more like Rodney's usual response to religion.

"Their cosmology includes a heliocentric solar system, and nothing they've said rules out evolution, although I gotta say, the animals seem so much like Earth's that I wouldn't be surprised if the Ancients transported or cloned the larger animals here. Larger animals, in fact, are their friends; they don't seem to eat the big ones, though—"

"I think they're what we would call ovo-lacto-pesco," Carson threw in helpfully, but Rodney failed to appreciate his contribution.

"And some of their clothes seem to use some skins and feathers," Rodney continued, louder, "but they were horrified when I asked if they ate the penguins. These people are so environmentally careful they make Greenpeace look like Union Carbide. They know more science than they're letting on." 

Rodney looked at Carson and started talking even faster, his annoyance at being interrupted already forgotten. "You should see their water purification system. We passed by one of their reservoirs on our very long walk this afternoon. All natural: they use sunlight, but they're obviously aware of microbes and the harm they can do, despite not having anything resembling a microscope—that they've shown us. They have an aqueduct system that would put the Romans to shame, but they prefer to use baked mud rather than rock. 

"I think they're concealing something. I think they're concealing a lot, in fact. They've deliberately designed everything to look like they have no science and technology, but they're using natural materials in highly sophisticated ways. Carson? What'd you see?"

Carson was absolutely stunned. He'd wondered at Rodney's interest in Kana's explanation of their beliefs. He knew the scientist wasn't as oblivious to people as he sometimes seemed, but he had had no idea Rodney was so observant—and not just of science, but of people.

None of Rodney's teammates seemed at all surprised, so they must see this side of him more often. Now, of course, they were all looking at Carson. 

"Today they asked me to treat relatively minor problems," Carson said lamely. "Most of the infections I treated are so recent they clearly didn't motivate the request for help. The patients I treated today were a test. I'm not sure of what. They watched me quite closely, and then they said at the end that they had others to show me tomorrow. Now that I think about it, they weren't at all fazed when I talked about synthesizing compounds; I tried to make it simpler for them, but they didn't ask me to do that. Oh, and their response to malaria includes a variety of natural measures; they kill some mosquitoes but are explicitly not trying to eradicate them, which strikes me as unusual." And the damned things had been biting him off and on all day, so that he almost wished they were eradicating them, but really, they'd chosen the better part.

He continued, with a conscious effort not to scratch, "They have quinine and some modest antibiotics, but if they have more sophisticated antimalarials or other drugs, they're not letting on." He frowned and added, "In fact, the more I think about it, the more I think none of the ailments I saw predated their request for medical help. Whatever they it is they want me to treat, they haven't shown me yet."

Sheppard nodded. "Ronon?"

"They had four guys following us besides our guide." Ronon didn't look disturbed at all by that idea, but it gave Carson a little shiver.

"What? I never saw them!" Rodney's voice squeaked a little. Apparently Carson wasn't alone in his reaction.

"You weren't supposed to," Sheppard answered.

"Then how come you did?"

"Because I am supposed to," Sheppard replied, and Ronon nodded. "They just watched us, like they were afraid we were gonna jump their guide or something."

"Or wander into areas we shouldn't?" Rodney asked pointedly.

"You were leading the way; you tell me," Sheppard told him.

Rodney frowned. "He didn't even stop me from walking into that...."

"Alpaca poop?" Sheppard grinned.

Rodney snorted. "You didn't stop me either!"

"You should be looking where you're going, not just at the Life Signs Detector! But we're getting off point here. Ronon?"

"They say they prefer wooden weapons to metal ones," the huge man said. "They have some pretty slick weapons—for sport. Can't imagine they'd do a damn bit of good against the Wraith. But they'd sure help if the local wildlife got out of hand."

"Penguins and alpacas?" Rodney asked.

"They have big cats, too," Sheppard said.

"When did you learn that?" Rodney demanded.

"When you were arguing with the locals about how much water they could treat in a day. Didn't you wonder why our guide carried a crossbow and arrows?"

"Oh. I thought that was in case we 'got out of hand'," Rodney answered dismissively.

Ronon nodded. "Be great for taking out animals, but nothing wearing armor."

"I bet it would still hurt," Carson muttered. Then he thought about how little they really knew about these people. "Rodney? How strong are these tactical vests we wear?"

"Oh, they'd hold up fine against arrows," Rodney said dismissively. "I mean, they were designed to protect against staff blasts! So unless they're using something really unusual as arrowheads...." He faltered, looking quickly at the colonel. "They wouldn't—I mean, if they were using any special materials, I should have detected—"

"You'd have detected dental fillings, Rodney, with all the scans you did. I'm sure they're just your standard, primi—" He broke off.

It was hard to tell in the dim light, but Teyla might have been glaring at the colonel.

"You said they prefer wood to metal?" Sheppard asked, turning to Ronon.

"Yeah. Mining and refining's more trouble than it's worth, they told me."

"Bloody hell," breathed Carson. "That doesn't sound very likely. They've got metal at the hospital. Not a lot of it, but I saw a few instruments. Metal's best for medical instruments," he explained. "Easier to disinfect than many other substances."

"So they work metal, but they prefer not to," Rodney snorted. "I'm with Carson," he said, waving in Carson's direction. "That doesn't sound very likely."

The rain on the roof sounded heavier; they were starting to raise their voices.

"I think I'm glad we have an indoor toilet," Rodney said.

"They wear little or no metal," Teyla pointed out. "Their clothes, their ornaments: plant fibers, for the most part. This animal substance"—she fingered the blanket—"is something like wool. No need to kill the animals. They are indeed careful stewards of their planet."

"What else did you notice, Teyla?"

"Challa seemed very nervous whenever Doctor Beckett asked him questions. Kana, however, never seemed nervous. The contrast was so great that I suspect Kana made an effort not to appear concerned."

Carson nodded. "Aye. I hadn't thought of it quite like that. Of course, it turns out they're related. He's her 'younger cousin.'" He made quotation marks in the air like the Americans did. "He was resentful when she mentioned it; they seem to get along, but he doesn't like being known just as her relation."

"She seems to be a person of great influence in the village," Teyla added.

"So: cousin rivalry, or keeping secrets?" Sheppard asked.

"Both," Ronon said.

Rodney climbed out of his hammock and took a lantern carefully off the hook. "Oil. Some kind of vegetable oil, I think," he said, sniffing. "Horn or something similar protecting it. No metal." He lifted the horn off to examine the base. "Pottery," he said. "Rather fine pottery, if you ask me."

"Didn't know you were a connoisseur of pottery," Sheppard said. "We should probably keep one of those burning all night so that we can find the bathroom."

Carson hopped down himself and walked over to a small table. "Basins of water," he said; they were pottery too. "And a bit of soap?" He smelled it. "Smells...floral." He smelled it again. Was that a hint of...? "You haven't told them about your citrus allergies?" he asked Rodney.

"My God! They're trying to kill me!" Rodney backed all the way up to the wall.

"It was clear enough at dinner," Carson corrected himself. "Probably no one thought about the soaps."

"Thank God we have you," Sheppard said. He was already horizontal in his hammock.

"Was that sarcasm?" Rodney snapped. "I could have—"

"Soap is on the right side of the right-hand basin," Carson said, moving all three small pieces there. They felt pleasant in his hand, little balls of soap of the sort fancy hotels and nice bed-and-breakfasts had. Not like the military dispensed. "If you use soap, rinse it in the right-hand basin. Left-hand basin will be a citrus-free zone." He moved that basin as far as he could from the other on the little wicker table. He put one of the soft towels on the left side of the basins, and left the others piled on the right.

"Thank you." Somehow Rodney managed not to sound grateful. "Don't anybody get confused in the night! God, how am I ever gonna sleep?" 

"I've been wondering that myself." Carson splashed some water over his face. He rinsed his hands thoroughly in the right-hand basin to rid himself of any traces of the soap. He'd used his own hand sanitizer at the hospital and hadn't checked the soap there. He hoped they'd get through this mission without Rodney suffering any medical problems.

"Let me check the toilet in case they've got anything in there to kill odors. I've been wondering about those since I first used one earlier today." The toilets really didn't smell, and he wasn't sure why.

He grabbed his medical scanner and a flashlight as a nervous voice from across the room said, "But I've already been used one!"

"And you still seem to be breathing," he called as he let the curtain of leaves fall behind him.

A few minutes later, he emerged with news: "They've got a fascinating mix of microbes in the pot. They break down human waste. I'll have to ask for details in the morning."

"Oh, please don't," Rodney said. "Or at least wait until I'm not around."

Carson rolled his eyes, although he was afraid the effect was lost in the shadows. "This confirms what Rodney has been saying: these people are going to great lengths to do everything naturally, but there's a great deal of science behind it. And I will not be letting them get away with that 'our medicines are so inferior to yours' nonsense tomorrow."

Sheppard snorted. "We sing, we dance; we are a simple people, Sahib." Carson was sure there was a reference he was supposed to be getting here, but he wasn't. Rodney was staring at the Colonel as if he was crazy, but Rodney often did that.

After a long pause, Sheppard said, "Doesn't anybody here read Doonesbury?"

Teyla took the opportunity to announce that she was going to the toilet, and preparations for the night began.

*****

Sheppard told Teyla to wake him during her watch, the final one, and, to his surprise, Ronon indicated that she should wake him too. He actually fit better in this hammock here in Lilliput than he did on his bed on Atlantis, although it wasn't hard to beat that little bed in his quarters. He wondered if all the people slept in such ample hammocks, or if the Jaqui simply realized the Lanteans were taller than they were. He'd wondered for a while now if the original Lanteans were short. Maybe their designers were all like Frank Lloyd Wright: bitter short people trying to weed out the tall ones. 

Despite the nice hammock, he slept lightly, waking when the rain slackened and again when it stopped, when Rodney muttered something in his sleep and later when Carson started tossing in his hammock. John never slept well off-world. It wasn't that he didn't trust his team to watch; he trusted them completely. At least consciously. Something in him just didn't want to let go and fall into a deep sleep in the field. He got along just fine anyway.

It was still full dark when Teyla signaled him it was time and woke Ronon up. Beckett started as John passed his hammock on the way to the toilet, but he had already fallen asleep again when he came back out. McKay didn't stir. How could he sleep like that?

Teyla must have read his mind, or his face, or the fact that he managed to bump Rodney's hammock as he grabbed some clothes, because she hissed to him as they left the hut, "You have told me before that protecting the civilians is a significant part of our duties."

John lowered his head guiltily, but Ronon just snorted: "You can say that again."

Teyla crossed her arms over her chest. "Considering how many sleepless nights they have had of late, and why they have those sleepless nights, we should be grateful they have an opportunity for a little extra sleep. I am." She stepped back inside.

"Yeah, uh, we'll be back before too long," Sheppard whispered to the leaves as they stilled behind her. He was still a little surprised about McKay, and, well, maybe a little concerned. He didn't imagine getting shot by the leader of his team helped McKay sleep better at night. Maybe at first, with the drugs, but he knew the recovery hadn't been exactly a breeze. But Beckett had assured him two weeks earlier that Rodney was good as new, or as good as he had been before that damned mission.

Ronon shrugged in the dim pre-dawn light. "I wasn't sure Beckett would sleep at all, considering."

John had to agree. Yesterday's walk had been tiring but not exhausting, so Beckett must feel reasonably secure to be able to sleep. Not truly phobic, then. That was good. He shouldn't go borrowing trouble.

McKay had shown before that he could sleep anywhere, and, on balance, John was glad to know he could still do it. 

Ronon had never surfed before, but he was game; John knew the Satedan was a quick learner with better reflexes and balance than John could ever hope to have, so he figured the big man would pick it up pretty quickly, despite his high center of gravity.

Taban met them as agreed, and the two men stripped off their outer clothes and boots while Taban eyed their clothing with amusement. Yeah, all they had was briefs, or John had briefs, and Ronon whatever he called that piece of underwear. Was that leather? He couldn't tell, and he didn't want to look too closely. He should probably just be glad the man didn't go commando, which he hadn't thought of till now.

"We didn't pack our swimming trunks," Sheppard told Taban, who grinned though he probably didn't know exactly what Sheppard meant. He wasn't sure if what Taban's own little Speedo was made of.

The eastern sky had been lightening, and suddenly a red crescent appeared over the horizon. "Wow," John breathed.

Taban grinned and showed them the boards he had brought for them.

John had hardly surfed in years, and Taban quickly took over the job of teaching Ronon while Sheppard got used to the feel of the heavy wood board and the ocean. Damn, but it felt good—even if he wasn't as sharp as he used to be. The penguins watched with curiosity and sometimes swam out and back with him.

Taban told him later on the beach, "The jamachi are quite friendly. We have trained them to come to us when summoned, and even when not, they often approach to see if we have fish."

"Why tame them?" Sheppard asked. Rodney talked last night like they were the Green Party, but surely the best thing for the birds wasn't codependence on the humans. Especially when the humans might be picked off by life-sucking alien vampires.

"We have done it for generations now," Taban said with a shrug, his smile dimming. Then he ran back into the water.

By the time the sun was well over the horizon, Sheppard felt the ache of straining muscles that hadn't seen that much use since before he was assigned to Antarctica. Ronon could ride some waves but wiped out often—still, it was far better than John had done when he first learned. "Time to head back," he called to the big man, who looked like he wanted to keep trying until he got it right every time.

"I'll do better tomorrow," Ronon growled as they slipped boots and dry clothes on to walk back to the hut.

John turned his head sharply. "I don't think we've established that we're gonna be here tomorrow yet."

"We will be," Ronon said confidently. That was kind of annoying.

He'd hoped to have a little more conversation with Taban, maybe get a better sense of him or his people, but the only odd moment was over the penguins. That didn't seem very useful, but Sheppard filed it away for future reference. You never knew when something might turn out to be important.

*****

Carson was amazed to wake up and find that he'd fallen back asleep after seeing the Colonel in the wee hours. He'd actually gotten some sleep on this strange world—not as much as he'd have had on a good night in his own bed, back on Atlantis, but enough.

Teyla was awake and apparently keeping an eye on things.

Their hosts had brought some light breakfast to the hut, and he ate outside with Teyla while Rodney woke up and complained inside; they could hear his voice but not make out any actual words, which seemed best for the time. He wasn't really a morning person.

Soon enough Rodney joined them. His hair was still damp and sticking up oddly.

"Forget your comb?" Carson asked with a nod.

Rodney made some sort of guttural sound and chewed a chunk of bread. "At least I didn't carry hair products out into the jungle," he said around the mouthful.

Carson frowned. "What do you mean?"

"Surely your hair doesn't do that thing in front naturally?"

Carson automatically put a hand up to his hair; he'd splashed some water over his face and head and run a comb through it earlier. It felt normal. "What thing in front?"

"You know! That, that thing!" Rodney stuck a hand up in front of his own forehead, his fingers sticking up. He needn't have. That increasingly lonely tuft of hair he still had in the front was sticking up quite well by itself. But Carson knew he didn't look like that.

He shook his head. "You're just jealous because I have hair in front." That should shut him up.

But Rodney waved a finger at Carson's head and snapped, "That's not hair! That's a pelt!"

Teyla stiffened, and Carson thought for a moment she was about to let them both have it for arguing so early in the day. Then she relaxed. "It is just the Colonel and Ronon."

Carson hadn't heard a thing. He looked at Rodney, who carried on eating as if this were normal. 

"Did you hear them?" he asked Rodney quietly.

Rodney shrugged, stuffing food in his mouth.

Teyla smiled with what might have been patience or superiority—most likely both.

Then Carson heard footsteps himself, and Sheppard and Ronon emerged, clothed but carrying wet underwear. Spares, he hoped. Going about without proper undergarments in this climate would probably lead to chafing. He wouldn't recommend it, but no one had asked him.

"He went surfing too?" Rodney half followed the two men into the hut but came back out quickly when there was a growl in response.

Sheppard reappeared a moment later. "Well, he's not as good as me, but I bet he's a damn sight better at it than you are."

Then Teyla nodded to Challa, who had appeared silently within the last few moments, and she and Carson returned to the hospital with the young man.

All the patients from the previous day seemed to be responding well, and Carson was as pleased as Kana seemed to be. 

"Well," he said awkwardly as they finished their examinations. "You have some more patients to show me?"

Kana smiled and nodded, but the smile seemed strained. "Our planet has not always been as it is now; that will be evident enough in a little while, and we feel certain you suspect. We have not interfered with Doctor McKay's readings, but we have our suspicions about what he is measuring."

"Are we talking radiation poisoning?" Carson asked, working to keep his voice steady. He hated radiation poisoning. Treating the Genii poisoned by their own people had been awful, even though they'd been able to save most of them.