A/N: Written for Tarlanx in the 2006 SGA Secret Santa.

Special thanks to my incredible beta, Silver_Cyanne, who dropped everything to get this turned around in time to make the deadline. Thanks so much, angel! You're as good an editor as you are a friend, and that's saying a hell of a lot.

Around them, the Christmas party was going strong. The live tree Elizabeth had brought in on the Daedalus seemed to shine through the entire mess hall; it was so brilliantly decorated. Carols were being piped in over the room's audio system. There was eggnog, hot spiced cider, turkey, ham, mashed potatoes, veggies, all the fixings, Christmas cookies, and more desserts than John Sheppard could count.

The noise level of the laughing celebrants was phenomenal, but he figured after the last three years they'd put in, the Atlantis crew had a right to party hard.

"Santa doesn't 'break in'," John patiently corrected. "He uses the chimney to surprise people. He visits everyone to leave presents."

"But the dwelling I was in when we shared that false reality on M5S-224 didn't have a hearth or chimney," Teyla pointed out.

At Teyla's comment Elizabeth, Laura Cadman, and Carson all broke into hysterical laughter at the other end of their usual table.

This wasn't going at all as John had hoped; although, it never did when he tried to explain Earth culture to his non-Earthborn friends. At least everyone was wearing the Santa caps he'd had shipped in on the Daedalus' last run. The seams of Ronon's were looking a bit stressed with all those dreadlocks bulging out of the white trim, but he was wearing it.

Taking a deep breath, John made another valiant effort to explain Santa Claus. "That's not the point. Santa's not really a physical person. He's more a cultural icon."

"Icon? Like the pictures on the computer screen?" Ronon questioned in utter, confused sincerity.

Even Teyla lost it this time.

John glanced over to Elizabeth, who was decked out in a red and white sweater with a sprig of holly at the neck, and pleaded, "Help me out here, will you?"

Elizabeth appeared to be laughing too hard to respond for a moment. Finally, she gasped out, "But you're doing so well," which only set off Laura and Carson's gales of laughter again.

John found himself grinning back. His whole life, he'd never had this kind of acceptance. For all that he'd had a family growing up, he'd never felt a part of one until he'd traveled to another galaxy. Taking a sip of his eggnog, he stared around at the happy people wearing the silly seasonal hats he'd given them, an alien warmth suffusing him. He didn't think he'd ever loved anything the way he did these people and this city. They were his in a way nothing on Earth had ever been, not even the people who'd borne him.

His grin faded as it settled on the empty seat beside him. The chair to his right was glaringly empty. Rodney's Santa hat sat on top of a pile of presents. So far, I-don't-do-Christmas McKay had been a no show. But that was hardly uncommon. Thinking back, John realized that Rodney hadn't made an appearance at Atlantis' other two Christmas parties, either.

He didn't know why he let McKay's avoidance of the season festivities upset him so. He knew it was nothing personal. McKay held all religions in contempt, and it wasn't as if he himself were a particularly religious man, it just seemed that with the kind of year they'd put in, they should embrace any excuse to celebrate life. But not McKay. He was alone over there in his lab, slaving away instead of having fun with his team.

John realized that that was what bothered him so much. For all that McKay was probably the most annoying man in two galaxies, he was an integral part of his team, and when Rodney wasn't here during the good times, it felt like there was a hole in the team.

He couldn't help but think back to McKay's alternate dimension twin who'd visited them in September. Rod had understood about team bonding and friendship. John knew it was wrong to compare the two McKays, for they were products of completely different realities, but he couldn't help but wish that his Rodney might buy a clue about the friendship thing.

He started from his reverie when someone touched his arm. He looked down to see Teyla's small, brown hand resting on the sleeve of his black hooded jacket. The Santa cap, when combined with her usual, low-cut, Athosian bodice made her look like something from a porn film.

"It is not his way," Teyla said in a soft voice, as if she'd been privy to his thoughts.

Wondering when he'd become so damn transparent, John met her eyes. The understanding he found there was something he didn't think he could ever bear to lose.

"I know," he answered in the same low voice as the others continued to joke around them while Grandma Got Run Over by a Reindeer blared over the speakers for the fourth time this hour.. "It's just . . . ."

Just what?

Some things he couldn't talk about, even with his team – especially with his team.

Rodney was a no show now when it was simply the emotional landscape of a holiday party he'd have to navigate. John didn't want to think about how far McKay would run if he ever found out how he felt about him. The one thing three years of close contact had honed in was that McKay was straight. And even if McKay weren't, John knew better than to take that type of chance with someone on his team. These kinds of feelings had cost him his world once already. He wasn't about to lose another family because of this insane infatuation.

"I know," Teyla said in that same soft tone, giving his arm a squeeze. The compassion in those bright, dark eyes of hers seemed to say that she really did understand.

He knew that was impossible. Decades of dealing with his nature had taught him how to stay in deep cover. He knew he hadn't slipped up. There was no way Teyla could suspect how he felt about Rodney, and, yet, her gaze seemed to say she did.

Gulping back his panic, John scrambled for a way out. This was worse than when he'd tried to talk to her about his feelings for the team that time Ronan had given himself to the Wraith to save their lives.

But she circumvented his fear with her usual grace and poise. Giving his arm another squeeze, she said, "You did say this was a season of miracles, did you not? Look," and gestured with her chin towards the mess room door to their left.

John was startled to see Rodney striding over to where they all sat. McKay was wearing his usual gray and blue science uniform, clear indication that he hadn't left his lab all day. Most of the other scientists in the room had stopped to change into their civvies like Elizabeth and he had. Rodney looked the same as he did every single day, but for some reason, John's stomach lurched the way it would when he put a jet plane into a steep, sudden descent. It was always like that for him with Rodney, that sense that he could crash and burn if he didn't pay close attention.

McKay's eyes seemed to take in the rambunctious party with a glance, dismissing it as unworthy of his interest just as quickly.

John wished that just once Rodney would let loose and allow himself to have some fun, but the tight expression on McKay's face told him that whatever had brought Rodney here, it wasn't the party.

"Merry Christmas," John greeted as Rodney stopped beside their table. Elizabeth, Teyla, Laura, and Carson all immediately echoed the sentiment, with Ronon's deep, less certain voice chiming in last.

McKay seemed almost taken aback. He blinked, his gaze seeming to jump from one Santa cap to the next, as if he'd genuinely forgotten it was Christmas Eve. After a momentary pause, Rodney seemed to rally with, "Ah, yes. Merry Christmas to you, too."

"Sit down, McKay," Ronon said.

"Yes," Teyla added. "There are presents and a new hat for you."

"Er, I don't – " McKay began.

Before Rodney could embarrass himself or put a damper on the party spirit, John quickly intervened. "It won't compromise your principles if you spend a few minutes with the team, will it?"

He tried out the pleading look that he usually got over with Elizabeth by using. He didn't expect to have much luck. McKay had seemed inured to his charm from the start.

From the other end of the table, Laura's inimitable New York accented voice all but ordered, "Rodney, it's Christmas. Sit down with your friends."

John often wondered what she'd learned of Rodney while sharing his mind. Since that incident, Laura almost seemed to have taken a sisterly attitude towards McKay, while Rodney just seemed freaked out whenever she was around.

"I didn't think this was your holiday," McKay all but sneered at Laura.

The smile left Carson's lips and his expression darkened as he gave a warning, "Rodney, don't be rude."

Laura wasn't even thrown by McKay's less than pleasant response. Holding his gaze, she answered from beneath the bobbing white ball of her Santa cap, "It isn't, but it's important to Carson and my friends. Besides which, it's fun. So sit down and play nice for a few minutes."

McKay looked as if he might respond with another of his usual snide remarks, but his gaze swept over everyone at the table and he made a visible effort to control himself before silently taking his usual seat at John's side.

"Open your presents, Rodney," Elizabeth instructed.

An almost stricken expression flashed across Rodney's face as he said, "I didn't get anyone anything."

"No one was expecting you to," John quickly reassured him.

The next few minutes passed with them watching a visibly self-conscious McKay unwrap the small pile of gifts they'd left on the table in front of his seat for him. Rodney seemed genuinely pleased by the Wormhole Extreme complete series that Elizabeth, Carson, and he had all gone in on.

"Thank you. This will be really warm," Rodney politely remarked when he opened the Athosian wooly vest Teyla had given him.

John tried to conceal his grin when Rodney unwrapped the final present, which was Ronan's. Teyla had obviously explained the Earth gift-giving tradition, for when they'd come to the table, there had been an identical, small, flat, package approximately the size of a computer disc in front of everyone's seat from Ronon, wrapped in a strange blue cloth.

Rodney's face puckered up in a wholly adorable – to John – frown of confusion as he unveiled the odd silver discus Ronon had given them all. "Er . . . what is it?"

"I can show you how to use it," Ronon offered.

"It's a little crowded in here now," John said and turned to Rodney to say, "Look over at the plant beside us and think ninja Shuriken."

Rodney's gaze turned to the leafy, small tree that now had three of Ronon's discs imbedded in its slender trunk. "Oh, wow, way cool." Rodney turned to Ronon and asked, "What did you get?"

Everyone other than Ronon grinned, for, after Rodney, Ronon had been the most difficult person to find a gift for.

Looking genuinely pleased, Ronon reached under the table and brought forth his booty, which consisted of five deadly looking, long-bladed knives.

"We all shopped in the same store," Elizabeth said with a laugh.

"Yeah, Ronon's keeping Death is Us in business this year," John added, setting most of the table off again. It still surprised him when people would laugh at his jokes.

"Is there really a store named Death is Us?" Ronon asked.

"No," John said.

Rodney surprised him by joining in the conversation with, "I don't know. Some of the survivalist shops near Area 51 could easily have fit the name."

"What were you doing in a survivalist store?" John asked, intrigued. When Rodney had joined their team, he'd barely known which side was the business end of a gun. In truth, he still wasn't what anyone would term skillful when it came to weapons. Ask McKay to build an atom bomb out of Tonka toys and he'd have no problem; but there was just something about primitive weapons that their resident genius didn't get.

"I wasn't actually in one. I had to pass one in town on the way to the Dairy Queen," Rodney explained, laying John's confusion to rest, even as Ronon chimed in with, "What's a 'survivalist' and a 'dairy queen'?"

"Oh, god, don't answer that, John, please," Elizabeth begged. "If I laugh any harder, Carson's going to have to hospitalize me."

His bewildered "Huh?" left everyone gasping for air.

When they calmed a bit, Laura competently explained survivalists and Dairy Queens to Ronon.

While she was speaking, Rodney leaned in close to John's ear and whispered, "Too bad. I always enjoy your explanations. You give such a surreal slant to the commonplace that it makes me wonder if we were raised on the same planet."

Rodney's words weren't exactly a compliment, but the warm brush of his breath against John's sensitive ear was so distracting that he couldn't rally his wits enough to object. He didn't let it happen often, but his guards were down this evening, dangerously so.

He took a deep breath as Rodney leaned back into his own seat, trying to convince a certain part of his body that the reaction it was having was inappropriate to both this time and place. He was grateful he was sitting.

The conversation flowed around him as Laura explained Chanukah to Ronon and Teyla. Finally, the tightness let up and John felt like he could walk again without embarrassing himself if he had to.

"This is all a lot of fun," Rodney cut into a lull in the conversation, "but I actually had an important reason for coming here."

"Rodney, we discussed this hours ago," Elizabeth said in her warning, almost maternal tone. "It's Christmas."

"But you said we could go," Rodney protested, sounding like a whiney four-year-old.

That same sense of dread shivering through him that he felt every time McKay became excited about some alien discovery, John asked, "Go where?"

Elizabeth was still focused on Rodney. "I said you could go when you asked me at six a.m. this morning, not in the middle of the Christmas party, and that permission was totally dependent upon the rest of the team's willingness. This isn't the right time for this, Rodney."

"But it took me this long to ensure it was safe," Rodney protested.

John tried again. "What are we talking about here?"

"We picked up a distress beacon around midnight last night, an Atlantean distress beacon," Rodney said, practically vibrating with excitement.

The sense of dread kicking into hyper drive, John said, "Might I remind you that the last time we responded to an Atlantean distress signal, we damn near lost Atlantis."

"I know," Rodney said. "But this isn't like that."

Whenever he got into these types of discussions with Rodney, John really questioned his own sanity. McKay was without doubt the most aggravating person he'd ever met, and yet, this was the guy he burned for. He couldn't fall for someone easy like Ronon, who, while undoubtedly intimidating, was someone he knew he'd get along with. No, he had to fixate on the person he was most likely to shoot.

"How is it different?" John demanded.

"To begin with, it's not a spaceship we're getting the signal from. It's an outpost on a planet on the far fringe of the Pegasus galaxy," Rodney said.

"Does it matter whether it's a ship or a planet? If there are Ancients there, they're going to want to reclaim Atlantis," John said. "I, for one, don't want to go through that again."

There were sounds of assent from everyone at the table. Their enthusiasm for meeting a living Ancient had been dimmed by that incident. Nobody who'd made Atlantis their home had yet to get over the trauma of having to leave her when her creators reclaimed her in October. The eviction had lasted six weeks before the people at this table had taken it into their own hands to get her back. They'd been back longer than they'd been away now – seven whole weeks – but everyone still remembered how horrible that enforced exile had been.

Rodney's face pinked in a flush as it always did whenever he became excited over something. "As far as we can tell, there aren't any Ancients there. There aren't any life signs at all on the planet."

"Then why are we going?" Ronon asked.

"There could be ZedPMs, along with other unknown devices. I sent a UAV through to investigate earlier today. Well, three, actually. The wind kept knocking them out of the air, but I finally got the data I needed. There's an outpost there. While the architecture is most definitely of Atlantean design, it's not like anything we've encountered before," Rodney said.

The reason John hated having these kinds of discussions with Rodney was because, more often than not, Rodney convinced him to go against his better judgment. He could feel his resolve weakening already. For all that they had radically different approaches to everything, McKay and he did share the almost unquenchable thirst to explore the unknown. Everyone sitting at this table did.

"Tell him the rest," Elizabeth ordered.

"The rest?" John echoed.

"The reason for the distress signal," Elizabeth clarified.

Appearing uncomfortable, McKay answered with visible reluctance, "Er, the DHD device appears to be malfunctioning. They couldn't dial out."

"But we can dial in?" John questioned.

"Yes. The power to form the wormhole is generated on the dialing side," Rodney answered.

"So we won't be able to dial home if we go?" Teyla questioned. She was always the most practical member of his team.

"Well, not using their DHD, but the DHD on the jumper should work fine," Rodney said.

"Is that an assumption or a fact?" John challenged. The last time he'd backed one of McKay's assumptions concerning Ancient artifacts, he'd been stranded for six months.

"Their DHD looks like it was overloaded. The crystal on top is black and charred. I can't see any reason why the jumper's controls wouldn't operate the gate," Rodney said.

John nodded, seeing Rodney's point. If the problem were a broken DHD, that shouldn't prevent the jumper from opening a wormhole back to Atlantis.

"What do you think broke the DHD?" Laura asked from the other side of the table.

Ronon followed her question up with one of his own. "And why didn't they fix it? The Ancestors built the gates. It doesn't make sense that they wouldn't be able to repair a broken DHD."

"What I want to know is why Atlantis didn't come to their aid," John said. "I mean, when we've lost contact with Earth for even short periods, SGC always investigates. Why wouldn't the Ancients have helped their own?"

"We don't know that they didn't," Rodney said. "There are no life signs. Atlantis could have evacuated the outpost."

Sensing something off in Rodney's tone, John said, "But you don't think they did."

"No. I think if the Ancients had rescued the people on the outpost, that they would have turned off the distress signal. The device has been broadcasting for millennia. The signal just reached Atlantis this morning," Rodney explained.

John digested that in silence for a moment before asking, "So why do you think Atlantis didn't send help when they lost contact with the outpost? They must have had some kind of scheduled contact with the outpost."

"My guess is that whatever happened to the outpost coincided with the siege of Atlantis. The timing would have been right for the signal to travel that long and far. The Ancients were pretty focused on survival then. They wouldn't have known anything was wrong at the outpost. From what the other Elizabeth said, the Ancients left in a hurry."

"But do you really think they'd forget about one of their own outposts?" Carson questioned.

"They left so fast that they never knew the other Elizabeth remained in the city. We've been able to monitor life signs throughout Atlantis since our first week here. The fact that they didn't bother to perform that kind of simple scan seems to show they left in a rush," Rodney said. "My guess is that they might have thought the outpost had already fallen to the Wraith. All of the other settled worlds had been attacked."

"But it didn't?" Teyla asked, understandably confused. Every record of the time of the evacuation of Atlantis seemed to indicate that the entire galaxy had fallen prey to the Wraith.

"There's no indication of a culling," Rodney said. "All the structures were intact. My guess is that the Wraith never knew that there were people on that planet. Aside from the Ancient outpost, there's no indication of civilization on that world. It's, um, pretty inhospitable."

"How inhospitable?" Ronon asked.

"The temperature is around -30 Celsius," Rodney said.

"That's cold?" Ronon questioned.

"That's way cold," John said.

"But not undoable," Rodney argued, his attention focusing on John. "It's not nearly as bad as Antarctica, which has recorded temperatures as low as -89 Celsius, and you lived there for more than a year. We have arctic survival gear."

"Okay, it's doable," John reluctantly agreed.

"So we can go?" Rodney had that excited four-year-old quality in his voice again. It wasn't a whine this time, but a hopeful excitement that John found unbearably attractive.

John glanced at Elizabeth.

"It's your call," she said.

"All right. We'll go," John said.

"Great. I'll go get ready," Rodney said, practically jumping to his feet in his eagerness.

"I didn't mean right now," John said.

"What? Why not now?" Rodney demanded.

"Rodney, it's Christmas Eve," John reminded.

"You already opened your presents," Rodney argued. "You're just sitting here. This is important."

Elizabeth, Carson, and John all seemed to vent identical sighs at the same moment.

"People want to enjoy their time off. It isn't fair of you to ask them to give that up," Laura valiantly tried to explain to the clueless McKay.

"This will only take a couple of hours. We'll go, check the outpost out, collect any spare ZedPMs lying around, and be back in no time," Rodney said. "You've got all day tomorrow to lie around in your underwear watching football games. We have a chance to do something significant here."

"Rodney," John began.

"Come on, please? How often do I ask you for anything?" Rodney pleaded.

At that moment, it felt like it was just Rodney and him in the room, with those big blue eyes begging for his indulgence.

Despite his best intentions, John found himself faltering. It was a damn good thing he wasn't sleeping with Rodney, he realized. The guy could already make him jump through hoops without that added incentive. He didn't want to think about how more susceptible he'd be to this kind of manipulation if they were actively involved.

Ronon's sarcastic, "Every time we encounter some new Ancient device," seemed to break the tension of the moment.

"Are you telling me you'd rather sit here wearing some stupid hat than go check out an Ancient outpost?" Rodney demanded of Ronon.

"I like the hat," Ronon denied, but John could see the interest in his face.

John looked to Teyla. The Santa cap looked especially delightful above her impish features.

As usual, she seemed to read his mind, for she shrugged and said, "It will only take a few hours. He will be unbearable if we do not agree."

"Hey," Rodney protested. "I'm still standing here."

"You really want us to go on a mission – right now in the middle of the Christmas party?" John asked.

Anyone else's conscience, if not social skills, would have forced them to concede to courtesy and wait until after the holiday, but Rodney just insisted, "You're not doing anything now that you can't do later, are you?"

"John, you don't have to do this now. It can wait until the day after tomorrow," Elizabeth said.

Rodney's eyes bugged out like she'd said the mission could wait a century.

"He'll be bouncing off the walls by morning," John said. "Look how he is now. Do you want to put up with how he'll be by tomorrow?"

"I could sedate him," Carson offered helpfully.

"What kind of doctor are you? What grounds are you going to sedate me on?" Rodney demanded.

"How about on the grounds of the rest of us wanting some peace and quiet on Christmas?" Carson returned. "This is very selfish of you."

"I'm being selfish?" Rodney appeared outraged. "They're the ones who want to laze around stuffing their faces instead of furthering science and human knowledge!"

"A man with cranberry stains on the front of his uniform should think twice about throwing around accusations of people 'stuffing their faces'," Carson pointed out.

It was only then that John noticed the big red stain on the gray part of Rodney's uniform top.

"Oh, for – " Rodney appeared nearly apoplectic. "You've already eaten. You've opened your gifts. This will only take a few hours. Two, three hours, tops, and then you can go back to bewildering Ronon with your Rod Sterling Earth travelogue. Come on. This is important!" Rodney cajoled.

"I could order him to go to his room," Elizabeth suggested in that half-joking way she had when Rodney pushed her to her limits.

"Go to my – " Rodney stammered.

Before McKay could say anything further and get himself confined to quarters, John said, "No. It'll just be easier all around if we humor him. You guys okay with this?" He checked with Teyla and Ronon, just to be sure.

"Anything to shut him up," Ronon said, while Teyla gave a polite nod.

"Thanks, guys!" Rodney said, seeming oblivious to the six glares directed his way. "You won't regret it!"

"I'm already regretting it," John groused. "Be geared up and in the jumper bay in twenty minutes. If you're one second late, the mission is scrubbed till the day after tomorrow."

"I'm already there," Rodney promised. After picking up his presents, he turned away and rushed out of the mess hall.

"Are you sure you want to do this now?" Elizabeth asked John as he slugged down the rest of his eggnog.

"I sure don't want to listen to him whine for the next two days," John said. "Like he said, it'll only be a couple of hours. Save us some of those gingerbread cookies."

"You got it," Elizabeth agreed.

"Can I wear the hat?" Ronon asked as they rose from the table.

John watched in fascination as Ronon effortlessly secured his five new knives on his person. Like all the others he wore concealed in his clothes and hair, they seemed to disappear immediately. John knew if he tried to carry even one knife down his sleeve the way Ronon did, he'd sever his hand the first time he tried to use it.

"Sure, why not," John said.

*~*~*

Fifteen minutes later, Rodney McKay stood in front of Jumper Three with three bags of tools and equipment piled at his feet. He'd had no idea what sort of equipment he might need, so he'd taken everything. Fussing with the zipper on the bag holding his survival gear, the fourth bag on the floor in front of him, he impatiently checked the time.

He was still smarting over some of the comments his supposed friends had made in the mess hall. He didn't understand why people had to be so difficult. It wasn't like he'd robbed them of their silly Christmas celebration. He'd waited until the team had finished eating and had completed exchanging gifts.

He seemed to be the only one who cared about their mission. They were here to explore the Pegasus galaxy, not waste time gabbing over dessert.

An unfamiliar wave of uneasiness stabbed through him that he reluctantly identified as a burst of conscience. He knew his teammates weren't slackers. More than that, he'd known he was being completely unreasonable before when he'd pulled them out of the party. He just . . . .

Truth was; he felt more comfortable interacting with them on missions. He knew his role in the team when they went through that gate. When they were sitting around in the mess hall . . . he never felt like he truly fit in. Sheppard had his charm to fall back on. Teyla and Ronon had exotic, warrior confidence down to an art. While he . . . he felt like he was back in high school. Only, instead of shunning him, the cool kids tolerated his presence because he was useful.

Rodney gave himself a mental shake. Damn, what the hell was he doing? They were about to travel to an alien world where people who were light-years beyond their technical ability had lived. He couldn't walk into that kind of situation battling these insecurities. He had to be centered and confident, for, when the shit hit the fan, as it inevitably did on their missions, it was going to be his brain that would pull them out of danger.

He was grateful when the opening jumper bay doors drew his attention from his internal dialogue.

Carrying their survival gear bags and their usual armory, Teyla and Ronon entered. They looked as savage and gorgeous as ever. Well, except for the incongruous Santa Cap Ronon was sporting. That threw off his whole Conon the Barbarian image.

"What's with the hat?" Rodney asked when the two stopped beside him.

"You said the planet was uninhabited. Sheppard said I could wear it," Ronon said.

"But why would you want to?" Rodney questioned, totally confused. He barely understood why John, who was raised in that culture, would voluntarily wear this kind of ridiculous hat. That Ronon, who had no childhood programming concerning the Santa cap to fall back on, would wear it, was utterly incomprehensible to him.

"Sheppard bought these and had them shipped in from another galaxy for us to wear," Ronon said. "They must be important to him. And I like it."

"Do they not wear these hats where you come from?" Teyla asked him. "Colonel Sheppard indicated that they were common on Earth this time of year."

"Some wear them," Rodney conceded.

"But not you?" Ronon asked.

Rodney shook his head 'no'. "I don't celebrate Christmas."

"Do you celebrate Chanukah like Lt. Cadman?" Teyla asked.

Not understanding why he suddenly felt so cornered, Rodney gave another negative shake of his head. Normally, he had no problem telling people to mind their own business when they harassed him about this kind of thing, but Teyla and Ronon were just trying to understand the culture of the people they were living with.

Rodney jumped as a hand squeezed his shoulder from behind. He'd been so caught up in the conversation that he hadn't even heard the bay doors open.

"Remember when I was explaining about all the different religions on Earth?" Sheppard's voice asked as he stepped into their circle. He, too, was still wearing the silly Santa cap. From the expressions on Teyla and Ronon's faces, it was clear that Sheppard had been as incomprehensible as ever in his attempt to acquaint them with Earth culture, but they both gave ready nods. "Rodney's religion is science."

"It's not a religion," Rodney quickly protested. "Science is based on fact, not faith. Can we go now?"

Rodney tried to inure himself to the hurt that flashed across Sheppard's face. He knew the Colonel had only been trying to help him out. He didn't understand why he always felt so threatened when he was asked to explain why he didn't buy into the illogical beliefs most religions seemed based upon.

Sheppard gave a tight nod and they entered the craft. After securing their gear, they took their usual seats, Sheppard and he in the pilot and co-pilot positions, Teyla and Ronon directly behind them.

The Canadian sergeant whose name Rodney could never remember cleared them for takeoff, and in moments they were hurtling through the gate. The sheer exhilaration of leaving a planet behind and actually going into the stargate never dimmed for him. Feeling his entire outlook lightening, Rodney turned to smile at Sheppard.

His smile faltered as he took in Sheppard's somber expression. Beneath the silly Santa cap, Sheppard's handsome face seemed strangely sad.

There was that weird moment of non-being as the stargate dematerialized them and then restructured them in less time than it took for a single heartbeat.

"Okay," Sheppard said as soon as they cleared the gate, "let's see if we're going to be calling this place home for the rest of our lives."

Rodney could almost feel his three companions holding their breath as Sheppard punched Atlantis' gate address into the jumper's DHD. To everyone's visible relief, the circle they'd just cleared filled with the familiar, water-like event horizon.

Elizabeth's relieved tone filled the jumper's speakers, "Jumper Three, we're reading your IDC signal."

"Looks like we're going home, folks," John said with a laugh. Speaking towards the intercom, he said, "We're good on this end, Elizabeth. We'll be back for turkey dinner in a couple of hours."

"Be careful, all of you," she counseled, and then the signal cut off as the event horizon closed down.

"That's a relief," Ronon said.

"Yeah," Rodney agreed.

The jumper circled the gate on M3T-940. Rodney found himself watching Sheppard as he worked the controls. The man still looked subdued as hell. Finally, he felt compelled to ask, "Are you all right?"

"Huh?" Sheppard questioned as he adjusted a control.

The world outside the jumper was blanketed in white, with windblown snow hitting them horizontally. The jumper shook under the force of the gale. Rodney watched Sheppard make another adjustment, and the turbulence receded to a manageable level.

"Did you mind coming on the mission?" Rodney belatedly realized that his pulling Sheppard away from the party might have been the cause of the colonel's unusually subdued mood.

"It's a hell of a time to ask that question, McKay," Sheppard said, his mouth twisting into its usual carefree smile. "How far to the outpost?"

Rodney looked out the windshield at the alien landscape below. The stargate was up on a hill, its dead DHD directly to the left of the gate, covered in snow. Only the blackened side of the crystal showed beneath the snow piled on top and around it.

Around the stargate, a seemingly endless conifer forest stretched to the horizon. Though the pine-like trees looked hardy, the amount of deadfall visible in the snowbound forest spoke of the severity of the winds, as if those shaking the ship around weren't indication enough. He realized that the trees themselves had to have some unusual protection against the cold. On Earth, nothing grew like this in the Arctic Circle.

"It's about fifteen miles south," Rodney said. Just so John wouldn't get them totally lost in the forest primeval below, he pointed to the right and said, "That way."

Sheppard nodded in response, and the jumper made a smooth turn in the indicated direction. Usually, as soon as the jumper turned in the correct direction, whatever city they were headed towards would come into view, but with the falling snow, the visibility was so poor that they could barely see a hundred yards in front of the craft.

As Sheppard's face settled back into that subdued set that Rodney didn't like, his conscience sent another of those inconvenient bursts of uneasiness stabbing through him. Their lives were too dependent upon each other to allow unneeded resentment to foster. They still weren't back to where they'd been before the Duranda debacle. He didn't want to add any more tension to their relationship.

Taking a deep breath, Rodney tried to do some damage control. He was as bad at that as he was at socializing, but he hoped Sheppard would appreciate the effort he was making enough to forgive him. "I, er, probably should have waited to make us go on this mission, huh?" It wasn't exactly an apology, but it was as close as he could get. "I mean, it is Christmas."

Sheppard took his eyes off the screen to meet his gaze. Those hazel eyes seemed as turbulent as the weather outside, and for a moment, Rodney was sure Sheppard was going to tell him just how selfish he'd been in insisting that they go on the mission right then instead of waiting until after the holiday.

But, to his surprise, Sheppard's features gentled and he smiled again. "It's okay. At least this way the team will be together for part of the holiday."

"But, you were with the team before I pulled you out of the party," Rodney found himself saying, confused by what felt like Sheppard's genuine sincerity. As much as he respected the man, he'd watched Sheppard manipulate people with his charm for far too long to allow himself to fall under its spell. He knew how good this man was at playing people. But for once, John's earnestness seemed real.

Sheppard vented another one of those sighs that he seemed to give around him a lot before saying, "There are four people on our team. Only three of them were at the Christmas party."

Rodney wasn't sure what he felt as he unraveled Sheppard's words. A good deal of it was shock, flavored with something like guilt, but beneath it all, was a jolt of sheer warmth at the idea that he'd been missed.

The conversation suddenly felt as alien as the snow-covered world passing below them. Rallying himself, Rodney tried to explain, "I, er, didn't think anyone would – " the 'care' he'd been about to say felt wrong, so he substituted, "notice."

"We noticed, Rodney. We always notice," Sheppard answered.

The words weren't quite an accusation, but Rodney was abruptly conscious of all the times Sheppard would tell him that the team was meeting in the mess hall after a mission and he'd forego the get-together to work in his lab. Or all the times they'd tell him they were going to the gym or to visit the Athosian settlement and he'd bow out because his work seemed more important.

He wished he could blame it all on his dedication to science. Granted, he'd rather tinker around with Ancient artifacts than do just about anything, but absenting himself wasn't just dedication to his work; experience had taught him that most people didn't want him around. But . . . Sheppard, Teyla, and Ronon weren't most people. It suddenly occurred to him that he was the one who'd been doing the shunning here, not the other way around. He was the one who would pick and choose which team events were worthy of his participation. Until this very moment, it had never occurred to him that his absence from the team get-togethers would hurt their feelings.

"I'm, er, not good with people," Rodney tried to explain. The excuse sounded inadequate to even his own ears.

Rodney was intensely aware of Teyla and Ronon sitting behind them, listening to every word they said. He had the feeling that John was acting as the spokesman for the entire team at the moment, though why he would think that, he couldn't say.

"Our team isn't people," Sheppard gently corrected. "Our team is family."

That cornered feeling back again, Rodney heard himself saying, "You can't have helped but notice when Jeannie was on Atlantis that I'm not exactly good with family, either."

The silence that fell after his words felt heavy enough to crush him.

Rodney could almost feel Sheppard picking and choosing his words. When Sheppard finally spoke, there was an unexpected, and certainly undeserved, kindness in his approach, "You don't have to be good with this family, Rodney. You just have to be there."

Rodney swallowed around a lump that felt as big as the silly red hat John was wearing as he promised, "I'll try to do better."

To his shock, Sheppard let him off the hook with an easy-going, "That's all anyone can ask."

For a minute or two, Rodney stared out at the white snow pummeling the windshield, feeling intensely uncomfortable. No matter what he did, when it came to people, he always seemed to make the wrong choice.

But, for once, he was being given a second chance. Realizing that he should try to make some kind of effort, Rodney self-consciously asked, "This Christmas thing. Are you guys doing a team thing tomorrow?"

He could almost touch the surprise that filled the jumper.

Teyla answered from behind him, "Colonel Sheppard has several DVDs that we are going to watch."

"You're not going to make them watch football again, are you?" Rodney asked.

Sheppard gave a negative shake of his head. "No. I was going to show them some seasonal stuff."

"What kind of stuff?" Rodney suspiciously asked, wondering if the Superbowl counted as a seasonal presentation.

"I ordered Rudolph, the Red-nosed Reindeer; Frosty, the Snowman, Santa Claus is Coming to Town, A Miracle on 34th Street, and Scrooge. We're going to have a marathon tomorrow. My place, at noon."

Rodney hadn't seen most of them. He wasn't sure he wanted to. Even as a small boy, he'd scorned the sentimental fairytales that most of his classmates had loved. And, he'd never been good at hiding his skepticism. He still cringed every time he remembered how his parents had reacted when he'd explained to the four-year-old Jeannie why Santa couldn't possibly be real. Dreading a similar experience with the team, he warned Sheppard. "I never did well with Christmas stuff."

He really expected Sheppard to lose patience with him, but instead of ordering him to buck up and think of someone other than himself, Sheppard softly asked, "What do you mean by not doing well?"

Rodney shrugged. "You know me. I never did know when to keep my mouth shut. I'd mock the stuff that didn't make sense. Jeannie would get upset, and my parents would go ballistic."

Rodney snapped his mouth shut, wondering if he'd said too much.

After a long pause, Sheppard said, "I don't think anyone in this group is going to go ballistic if you make fun of Rudolph. Just lay off the Island of Lost Toys, okay?"

For a minute, he thought Sheppard was serious, then he saw how that slender mouth was twitching, and he realized John was joking with him.

His throat tightening up again, Rodney muttered, "Okay."

This time the silence wasn't uncomfortable.

Teyla broke it a few minutes later by asking, "Everyone back in Atlantis spoke fondly of these winter celebrations. Did you never enjoy a single one, Rodney?"

She sounded like she was really interested.

Always susceptible to her kindness and beauty, Rodney found himself answering, "There was one Christmas when Jeannie was really little that was almost fun. The entire family watched that Scrooge movie together and there was no fighting. That Christmas was okay."

"You liked Scrooge?" Sheppard eagerly enquired. Whatever was in Rodney's expression seemed to make him add, "Don't worry. You won't lose your Rationalist Society membership card if you tell us the truth. We'll keep your secret."

It was a stupid thing to feel self-conscious about, Rodney realized. It was just a movie, like Star Wars or Indiana Jones, and, yet, it still made him feel like he was going back on his principles to admit to having enjoyed it. After a long pause, he said, "If you can turn your brain off and ignore how completely unbelievable the story line is, it wasn't so bad."

"What part was unbelievable?" Sheppard asked.

Something in his tone put Rodney on guard. Unable to find any obvious traps, he finally answered, "Well, the three ghosts showing up was pretty implausible."

"As implausible as monsters that suck your lifeforce out with their hands?" Sheppard challenged. "Or glowy beings that float through walls like ghosts? Or cities that can fly between galaxies? Most people on Earth would find all that stuff equally unbelievable."

"You're not trying to say that you believe any of that Ghost of Christmas Past stuff, are you?" Rodney asked, genuinely worried, because he never could understand what made Sheppard tick. For all he knew, Sheppard might still believe in Santa Claus, the Easter Bunny, and all that other nonsense.

"Well, maybe old Ebenezer just didn't understand what was going on. It happened before the scientific revolution, didn't it? Maybe ghosts were the only way he could explain what happened to him."

Finally seeing the laughter in Sheppard's eyes, Rodney relaxed. "Yes, I'm sure you're right. Three Ancients were probably hanging around and decided to pay a call on the guy because he was so mean to his subordinates."

"In that case, you better hope it was fantasy," Sheppard said.

"Huh?" Rodney asked.

"I heard you bawling out Dr. Lazlo last week," Sheppard said. "Dickens would have killed for your vocabulary."

"Thanks, I think," Rodney said, not knowing why he suddenly felt better. But Sheppard was grinning now instead of looking all sad and moody, and, even if the conversation had been painful and hit a little closer to home than Rodney would have liked, he really felt that at least Sheppard understood his reactions now. He didn't understand why he craved Sheppard's approval the way he did, he just knew he felt better when John wasn't upset with him. Which was damn weird, because most of the time, he couldn't give a damn whether people liked him or not.

"Is that it?" Ronon called all their attention to the windscreen, beyond which the nebulous outline of a small grouping of buildings could be seen forming through the moving white veil.

When they got close enough to see through the snow, they were able to make out five slender towers that were similar, but not identical, in design to those in Atlantis. They surrounded a squat, rounded complex that was unfamiliar. Sitting on the snowy plain, with the winds blowing the falling snow through them, the Ancient architecture seemed even more alien, like something frozen in time.

Catching discrepancies in the jumper's probes, Rodney switched to the hand held unit. "That's weird."

"What's weird?" Sheppard asked.

"There's no shield around the outpost," Rodney said.

"Well, that's good for us, isn't it?" Sheppard said.

"Yes, but it doesn't make sense," Rodney muttered, taking a different set of readings, and coming up with the same illogical findings.

"Why doesn't it make sense?" Teyla asked.

"The winds out there are as strong as those that blasted Atlantis during that monster storm during our first year there. The only thing that kept the city standing was the shield. These winds should have snapped those towers in half millennia ago, but they're in perfect condition," Rodney explained.

"That is weird," Sheppard agreed. After a minute or so of frantic-looking manipulation of the controls, he said, "I'm going to have to put her down on the edge of the woods. The winds are too strong to risk bringing the jumper in closer to the towers. So, suit up."

Although the winds had to be giving him a devil of a time, Sheppard landed the ship as gently as if they were setting down in the jumper bay. Pocketing the hand scanner, Rodney followed his teammates to the cargo section to gear up.

The heavy-duty insulation on the pants, boots, gloves, face shield, ski-goggles, and survival parka had Rodney feeling like the Michelin Man in minutes. Because they had no way of judging how deep the snow was, they had to wear snow shoes. Rodney felt like he might topple over any second and they weren't even outside yet.

"You need a hand with that?" Ronon asked when Rodney was struggling to manage the three bags he'd packed his equipment into. Ronon had the Santa cap on under his parka. Rodney was relieved to see that John had taken his off.

Rodney nodded, and before he knew it, the two heaviest bags were hanging comfortably off Ronon's wide shoulders.

"Thanks," Rodney acknowledged, shouldering the lightest.

"Between the wind and snow out there, I think we should tether ourselves together so no one gets lost," Sheppard suggested, thrusting a thick red rope their way.

"Good idea. Do you want me to take point?" Ronon asked. At Sheppard's nod, he tied the end of the rope around his waist and passed the rolled up bulk to Teyla, who followed suit, leaving about six feet of rope between them.

Rodney struggled to get his gloves off when the rope was offered to him.

"I got it," Sheppard said, stepping forward to secure the rope around Rodney's waist faster than Rodney was able to remove one glove. Part of him felt he should be insulted that Sheppard might think him incapable of properly tying himself in, but the part of him that had fumbled every single sports event in school was grateful that Sheppard had spared him the embarrassment of doing it wrong or having to ask for assistance.

"You all ready?" Sheppard asked after he'd tied himself in, his hand paused over the back hatch release.

"Melting, here," Rodney groused.

Sheppard grinned and threw the release, and a cold as chilling as that of deep space blasted Rodney and the rest of them as the wind swept a wall of white into the jumper.

They all staggered down the ramp, and Sheppard used the remote to close the hatch behind them. For a minute or two, they stood there in the snow, shivering with cold, trying to get their bearings in the moving whiteness and stay vertical against the force of the pounding winds.

Sheppard had put the jumper down on the fringe of the woods. It was the only place with anything that passed for shelter in these winds, Rodney realized, as he brushed snow off his goggles and stared at the huge pine trees around them.

His face and chin were so cold that they felt like they'd shatter like glass if he smiled or sneezed. His nose was already starting to drip from the cold. He could feel the liquid freezing against his skin as soon as it seeped out. He had to keep brushing it clear of his nostrils to keep the passages open.

The snow underfoot crunched with every movement. It was hard to stand in it, let alone walk. Rodney found himself clinging to the red tether just to keep his footing under the force of the winds.

The wind was howling like a banshee out of the north, but in between the bursts of screeching air, the woods were eerily silent and lifeless. Not that any self-respecting bird would have been stirring in this kind of weather, but the utter lack of sound was unnerving.

Still, the snow-covered pine forest was beautiful in a winter wonderland kind of way. It was a little too savage and wild for a Christmas card, not to mention downright hostile, but there was a compelling beauty to it all the same.

With the wind, there was movement everywhere. The point of Ronon's pistol kept jumping from one tree to another as the swaying branches caught his Runner-trained reflexes.

Sheppard and Teyla seemed to be having equal trouble with the shifting branches around them. Rodney knew he had the battle instincts of a sponge. He didn't find the movement distracting. He was too cold to worry about it. Wondering if he could possibly be getting frostbite in his toes already, he shifted his feet and banged his thick-gloved hands together.

Blinking through the yellow tinted ski-goggles, he tried to focus on a nearby tree. There was no hint of the Ancient outpost due to the blinding snow. The area was just too uniformly white. All that snow left a person feeling strangely disconnected and disoriented. White above, white below, white in front.

Rodney's gaze moved over the line of pines, glad to be looking at something with contrast. Their dark-needles and dead branches had fallen onto the snow beneath them to make a blotchy looking pattern that stretched deep into the forest. Nothing but trees as far as he could see . . . .

Rodney's moving gaze froze as it picked out an anomaly. It jumped back to the tree in question.

All the other trees had been green at the top, with their brownish-black trunks below. This one was an almost moss green at the bottom, not the darker green of the pine needles. Instead of the unbroken bluish white of the snow that was topping all the other trees, this one was fringed in black-speckled white. And, it had a face, a distinctly human face, male with a long brown beard and winsome smile.

Rodney hissed in a breath as he interpreted what his eyes were showing him. It wasn't a pine tree. It was a man, a giant of a man, dressed in a long green velvet robe that was trimmed with the black-speckled white fur that fringed all the kings' capes in movies. When his shocked gaze focused on the red-berried holly wreath crowning the giant's long, brown, curl-covered head, Rodney knew he couldn't be seeing what he was seeing.

For all intents and purposes, he was looking at the Ghost of Christmas Present.

"Hey, do you guys – " Rodney shut his mouth. What was he going to ask? Did they see the Ghost of Christmas Present? He might as well ask if they could see Santa Claus standing there.

All three of his teammates' visored faces turned his way.

"What?" Sheppard asked, raising his voice to be heard over the incessant howling of the wind.

Rodney stared at the giant a moment longer to make sure it was really there. His team was facing away from where it stood in the shadows.

"Do you see anything over there?" Rodney shouted over the wind, pointing to the giant.

The instant Sheppard, Teyla, and Ronon turned that way, exactly what Rodney had been dreading happened. The giant blinked out of existence as if he'd never been there.

"Just trees," Ronon said.

"What are we looking for?" Sheppard asked.

Somehow, he wasn't quite prepared to tell his mission leader that he'd just seen Father Christmas grinning at him like the Cheshire cat. Trying to bank down his panic, because he knew hallucinations were a bad sign mental heath wise, he took a deep breath of the frigid air and shouted over the wind, "Nothing. Just the wind playing tricks on me, I guess."

Sheppard didn't press him for further information. Nodding, he yelled back, "Let's head into the city and see if we can find some shelter."

Everyone nodded.

Ronon cut a slow path through the unbroken snow, the rest of them staggering behind him. Rodney had never been so grateful for anything as he was for the rope tethering them together. He couldn't count how many times it kept him from falling face first into the snow, or veering off in the wrong direction.

Of course, the fact that he couldn't stop thinking about the impossibility he'd seen in the woods behind them wasn't helping his concentration any. Time and again, Sheppard would shout at him from behind to pay attention when Rodney would find himself twisting around to see if he could see the giant in the snow-blasted wilderness.

The border of the forest was only about a quarter of a mile from the outpost, but it seemed to take forever to reach the structures. Rodney realized that his estimation of the trip taking only a few hours was grossly exaggerated. At this rate, they'd be lucky to reach the buildings in an hour.

He didn't know how Ronon was guiding them. He couldn't see a thing in front of them but the wind-driven snow. He knew he'd have been lost in seconds if he'd tried to walk from the woods to the outpost alone. But it was weird having to follow on blind faith, not knowing if they were even headed in the right direction. He felt like one of the hobbits in Lord of the Rings when they were ascending Mt. Caradhras, completely out of his element and having to rely on the strengths of others for his very survival. It wasn't a feeling he liked.

Finally, the ground beneath their feet changed from deep snow to metal plates that were similar in construction to those on the balconies in Atlantis.

"There's no snow accumulated here," Teyla said what they all were no doubt thinking.

Rodney already had his scanner out and was taking readings, manipulating it as best he could with his clumsy gloves. "There's a small current keeping the snow clear."

"Are you picking up any ZPMs?" Sheppard asked the question that had brought them here.

"No, but the place could have the kind of shielding around it that blocked sensors the way the Aurora's life-pods did," Rodney said.

They were close enough to see the buildings now. When you looked at Atlantis' towers, they were smooth and shining like jewels rising out of the ocean. These buildings had a similar form, but their surface wasn't sleek like Atlantis' buildings. These were honeycombed with a web of uniform depressions or holes that had obviously been built into the structures.

"Wow," Rodney said as he interpreted the data his scanner was giving him.

"What?" Sheppard asked.

"You see the honeycombs in the surface of the buildings?" Rodney shouted over the gales so those up front could hear him. "They're absorbing the wind, rather than deflecting it. That's why the buildings are still standing. I think they're pulling energy from the wind to power this place. They're at least powering the shield that's keeping the snow from burying the outpost."

"Which building should we start with?" Sheppard asked, his visored gaze moving among the five towers.

Rodney scanned the region, and then pointed to the round, squat building in the center of all those tapering spires. "That one has the strongest readings."

"Okay. Head over there, Ronon," Sheppard called.

The going was much easier now that they didn't have to slug through a couple of feet of snow. They reached the squat silver building in several minutes.

The temperatures on the planet precluded there being any stained glass on the door, but the portal was shaped the same as those on Atlantis. It liked Sheppard's gene as much as Atlantis did. The door opened the instant Sheppard stepped onto the stairs in front of it.

Likewise, the moment Sheppard entered the complex, the lights powered up and they found themselves staring down eerily familiar corridors, replete with ten thousand year old, dead potted plants.

One worry was immediately dispelled. It appeared life support was still working. Rodney felt the temperature heating up as the outer door closed behind them and the building responded to their presence.

The corridor they found themselves in was huge, with that same cathedral-like feel of antiquity and reverence that Atlantis had whenever the rooms were empty. After nearly three years of living in Atlantis, Rodney knew he shouldn't be cowed by the ancient presence that seemed to breathe through the place, but, when a person stepped into a building that was this far beyond their technology, it was hard not to feel small in its shadow.

The hallway was lined with doors, each bearing the familiar-patterned stained glass like Atlantis.

They all quickly undid the rope tying them together and started peeling off their survival gear. They'd only been inside for under a minute, but already they'd gone from freezing to overheated.

Rodney had his snow shoes off and was pulling down his snow pants when his gaze shifted to his left.

Standing there in the doorway to the nearest room, looking as real as John Sheppard beside him, stood the green-robed, holly-crowned giant he'd seen outside. Now that he beheld the giant in better light, Rodney could see the icicles that were dangling from the holly wreath around his head. The man seemed to glow with a golden light, like the figures in those old religious paintings Jeannie used to drag him to museums to see when she was on her art kick.

Rodney didn't know what kind of sound he made, but all three of his half-undressed teammates' P-90s were up and scanning in all directions.

His snow pants down around his knees and his parka hanging off his left shoulder, Sheppard's weapon was focused directly at where the giant was standing, but he wasn't reacting to the thing. It almost looked like he was trailing Rodney's own gaze, but Sheppard's gun moved on as if there were nothing worth seeing there as he asked Rodney, "What? What did you see?"

The giant winked at Rodney and then blinked out of existence again.

"Oh, no," Rodney whispered. Feeling Teyla and Ronon's dark gazes settle on him, he began to shake. "I, er, I think I'm going to have to report myself unfit for duty. Is that how you say it in the military?" He knew he was babbling, but he felt like he was seconds away from a breakdown.

"What do you mean 'unfit for duty'?" John asked, real concern in his face. "What's wrong?"

"I'm . . . I'm having hallucinations," Rodney reluctantly confided.

"What kind of hallucinations?" Sheppard asked.

Rodney gulped. "When we stepped out of the jumper, I thought I saw something that couldn't possibly be there standing in the forest. I just saw it again in that doorway." Rodney pointed to the door before them on the left.

His teammates looked from the door back to him, everyone's face lined with nervous tension. Even the silly Santa cap on Ronon's head couldn't mask his uneasiness.

"What kind of something?" Sheppard questioned.

"What did you see?" Teyla asked.

Rodney looked at Sheppard. "You – you won't believe me. It's . . . crazy."

"Just tell us what you saw, McKay," Sheppard snapped.

Rodney took a deep breath. "I saw . . . a giant. He was twice as big as Ronon. He was wearing a long green velvet robe with a wreath of holly on his head . . . just like the Ghost of Christmas Present in Scrooge."

"The Ghost of . . . ." Sheppard echoed. His face tightening with anger, he continued, "McKay, if that's your idea of humor – "

"Humor?" Rodney heard himself yell. "Do I look like I'm joking here? Why do you think I didn't want to tell you? I knew you'd never believe me. I know how crazy it sounds, but that's what I saw. I swear."

Sheppard, Teyla, and Ronon's gazes all dug into his face.

Rodney didn't really expect to be believed. After all, he'd seen the thing and couldn't believe it. How could he expect them to believe him?

But after a moment, the anger faded from Sheppard's features and he asked in a gentler tone. "You seriously saw . . . ?"

"The Ghost of Christmas Present," Rodney said, holding that hazel gaze.

"What is this Ghost of Christmas Present?" Ronon questioned in that rough tone he got whenever he was trying to hide his fear.

Before Sheppard could plunge them into some phantasmagoric explanation of the Dickens story, Rodney quickly explained, "It's a character from a popular Christmas Tale. It's a being that comes to this mean-spirited miser to make him see the error of his ways." His gaze jumped back to Sheppard, "And if you were about to suggest any similarity in personalities there, just don't. I'm freaked out enough as it is without you making fun of me."

To his credit, Sheppard didn't even crack a smile. "I wasn't going to say a word on that line."

Reading only worry in Sheppard's handsome face, Rodney couldn't help but ask, "You really believe me?"

"Do I believe you saw the Ghost of Christmas Present? No. Do I believe you saw something that looked like it – yes," Sheppard said. "What does your scanner say?"

Rodney felt his face warm as he realized that he'd been so thrown by the giant that he hadn't even checked his scanner. "I, um . . . ." Quickly withdrawing the scanner from his pocket, he recalibrated and double-checked his readings. "There's nothing showing up here but us."

"Could it have been a holograph?" Teyla suggested.

Rodney shook his head. "It looked solid, and, well, if it were a holograph, how come no one but me could see it? Colonel Sheppard looked directly at where it was standing before and didn't react to it."

"That is strange," Teyla agreed.

"Okay, people, let's stay on guard," Sheppard said. "I guess we'd better check that room out first," Sheppard said, pointing at the door where Rodney had seen the giant.

The doors slid open as they approached and the lights came on in what turned out to be an empty conference room that looked identical to the one they used for their mission briefings.

The next dozen or so rooms proved equally uninspiring.

"I'm getting a power reading from inside this one," Rodney reported as they neared the latest in an endless seeming stream of doors.

The door dilated open and they stepped into a room lined with oddly familiar niches. The room was huge, and there were hundreds of shelves.

"It's like the Aurora," Sheppard said as he recognized row upon row of gleaming life pods.

"I'm not reading any life signs, but I didn't on the Aurora>, either," Rodney said. "They're no doubt shielded."

"Which is probably why the Wraith never culled here," Teyla said.

They each headed for a different bank of pods.

Rodney reached his first. Staring through the smoky glass, he was relieved that the view wasn't any clearer. The figure lying inside might just as well have been fed on by a Wraith, it was desiccated and long dead. Long white hair fell halfway down the being's chest. It was only the lack of beard that made Rodney think the body was female. The skin was so deeply lined and deteriorated that he couldn't even distinguish features anymore.

"This one's dead," Rodney reported.

"I've got four over here," Ronon called. "All dead."

"Four here," Sheppard reported. "Dead, too."

"These are deceased, as well," Teyla called.

Rodney moved to a control panel like those he'd used to access the Aurora's pods. Calling up a diagnostic screen, he did some quick reading.

"What do you think happened here?" Sheppard asked as the other three joined Rodney at the control panel. "Did the pods fail?"

Rechecking his findings one last time, Rodney shook his head 'no'. "The pods are still functional. I can't be sure until Carson's people perform an autopsy, but from these readings, I'd say they died of old age."

"But the pods prolong life, don't they?" Sheppard asked in a hushed voice.

A shiver running through him, Rodney nodded. "Yes, they do. I think these people were here for longer than the Aurora's crew was in stasis."

"Do you need to take any more readings here?" Sheppard asked, his gaze moving nervously among the life support units that had turned into caskets for their occupants.

"No, I'm done," Rodney said, wanting to get away from these tombs as much as the others clearly wanted to.

They all seemed to breathe a sigh of relief as they stepped out into the Atlantis-like corridor that had those familiar banks of bubbling blue liquid lining it.

Teyla and Ronon started to move down the corridor in the direction they'd been searching. Rodney stopped as Sheppard paused beside him.

"How are you doing?" Sheppard asked.

Rodney wasn't used to anyone voicing concern for him, not unless he had an arrow sticking out of his butt, and sometimes not even then. "Okay, I guess. This isn't turning out at all as I'd hoped."

"Giant ghosts and rooms full of corpses," Sheppard said with one of his grins. "Can't say it's on my list of holiday hot spots, either."

"I'm sorry now I didn't wait till after Christmas," Rodney said.

Sheppard reached out and gave his arm a friendly pat. "It's okay. We'll check the rest of the place out and head home. By the time we get back, we'll all be ready for more turkey. This time you're eating with us, right?"

Rodney's stomach fluttered at the expression in Sheppard's eyes. It happened like this sometimes when they were alone and not sniping at each other. For no apparent reason, Rodney would feel as if the ground had fallen out from beneath him.

Taking a deep breath, he nodded. "Yes. I'm, er, sorry I ruined your Christmas."

"You didn't ruin it," Sheppard didn't sound as if he were lying. "Come on, let's check the next room out."

Rodney forced his gaze away from Sheppard's. The second he did; he was able to breathe easier.

They hastened their pace to rejoin Teyla and Ronon, who were waiting outside the next room in the corridor.

There was a familiar octagonal shaped control box on the outside wall of this room that made Rodney's heart skip a beat.

"What is it?" Sheppard asked.

Rodney opened the panel just to be certain. "This is just like the power junction panel back on Atlantis outside the ZedPM generator room." Seeing the excitement in everyone's face, he reminded, "Remember, I didn't detect any ZedPMs when I scanned for them."

"You didn't detect any life pods, either," Sheppard countered. "The room could be shielded."

Rodney nodded. As one, the four of them stepped up to the door.

"Oh, no," Teyla gasped as the lights came on and revealed the interior.

For once, Rodney couldn't even take any joy in being proven right. The long, vaguely fleur-de-lis shaped device was definitely a ZPM generator. There were even ZPMs in it, or, rather, the remains of Zero Point Modules. These ZPMs were in about the same shape as the outpost's inhabitants. Broken crystal and glass in the familiar orange color surrounded the holes where the ZPMs had once stood.

Rodney bit his lip as yet another hope bit the dust. No matter how hard they tried, they never seemed to get a break when it came to these elusive power sources.

"What happened here?" Sheppard asked.

Rodney was already scanning. "They all shattered at once. It looks like they exploded from an overload."

"Is that even possible?" Sheppard, who understood far more about quantum physics than any military man had a right to, questioned.

"I'd have said no before seeing this," Rodney said. "The subspace field the ZedPMs create to generate power should have buffered the crystal. If anything happened at all, the field should have simply collapsed, not . . . blown up the ZedPMs. This is really weird."

"Everything here is really weird," Sheppard agreed. "In fact, this place is giving me the creeps."

"Yeah," Ronon said from the other side of the broken generator.

"I, too, find this place unnerving," Teyla admitted.

"Let's hurry up and get through with this, okay? Is there anything more you need to see here?" Sheppard asked him.

"Not in this room. In the few places we've found generator units like this – Atlantis, the outpost in Antarctica, and that city the Asuran Replicators built, there was usually a lab located nearby. I'd like to check the Ancient computers in there to see if I can figure out what caused this."

Sheppard nodded. "Okay."

Rodney was relieved when the next room in the corridor revealed the same kind of control panels and computer banks that Atlantis' labs all had.

Rodney moved to the main unit and activated it. There was always a daunting amount of information in these Ancient databases. It was no different here. It took almost a half hour of searching, while Sheppard, Teyla, and Ronon became increasingly twitchier while they waited, before Rodney discovered what he was looking for.

"Oh, wow, this is tragic," Rodney said, rereading to make sure he was translating right.

"What happened?" Teyla asked.

"This complex was originally a lab researching Ascension. When the Wraith started overwhelming the human worlds, the Ancients abandoned their Ascension research here. The experiment that destroyed the ZedPMs was another version of the Arcturus Project. The Ancients were trying to generate vacuum energy from our own dimension. Their experiment didn't simply enhance the power of their ZedPMs like they'd hoped; it destroyed the ZedPMs they were working on, as well as every other ZedPM on the planet. The crystal that powers the DHD device is based on a similar technology, so their experiment blew that out, too. They were virtually left without power and no way to dial home."

"But there is power here," Teyla said.

Rodney nodded. "The wind generators gave them enough energy to keep the life support, lights, and other low-energy technology working, but weren't nearly powerful enough to operate the gate. When the food started to run out, they set the subspace distress signal and placed themselves in the stasis pods in the hopes that they'd survive until the Atlanteans either picked up their signal or opened the gate to find out why there hadn't been any contact. They waited here in stasis for millennia for a rescue that never happened," Rodney explained, his heart aching for these long dead scientists.

He knew what it felt like to destroy the ZPM that was sustaining power in their city. He knew what it felt like when an experiment went wrong and people died. God, did he know what that felt like.

"That is sad," Teyla said, sounding as upset by those ancient mishaps as Rodney felt.

"So there's really nothing we can learn here?" Sheppard said after a long silence.

"I'd like to upload the data on their experiment," Rodney said. "It might prevent us from duplicating their mistakes. It will take about twenty minutes to collect the information."

"Okay," Sheppard agreed. "There's only one more room in this corridor. We'll check it out while you're working. Will you be okay alone here?"

"You mean am I afraid of the Ghost of Christmas Present?" Rodney forced himself to joke. Truth was; he was terrified. "No. It's the Ghost of Christmas Past that has reign here. I'll just upload their sad history and we can get home to that turkey dinner you were talking about."

"Sounds like a plan. We'll have our radios on. Call if you need us," Sheppard instructed.

Telling himself that the dread curling through his gut as he watched his teammates leave the room was completely childish, Rodney forced his attention onto the Ancient computer.

The interface took longer than he anticipated. The outpost's crystals were of an older design than those of Atlantis and it took him a while to find the correct frequency to get the outpost computer to talk to his laptop.

It was only as his stomach growled and he glanced down at the chronometer at the bottom of his laptop screen that he realized he'd been at this for three whole hours. He hated when he lost track of time like this. The others were going to kill him . . . .

His already stressed out brain froze as he thought of his team. Neither Sheppard nor Ronon were long on patience. Experience had shown Rodney that if he told that pair something would take twenty minutes to complete, they'd be hounding him after five minutes demanding when it would be done. But not a one of his teammates had stuck their head in here to ask what was taking so long or even tried to contact him over the open radio channel.

Rodney's hand jumped to the transmit switch on his headset. "Sheppard? You still out there?"

The receiver in his ear crackled, like it were picking up an open channel, but no sound emerged. "Sheppard?" he repeated, then called in a far more frantic tone, "Teyla? Ronon? Come on, guys. This isn't funny."

All he got was static. He didn't even think about closing down his laptop. Before his last word had stopped echoing through the eerily empty computer room, he was rushing for the door.

Sheppard had said they were checking out the last room on this floor, which was at the end of the hall. Rodney ran for the door, skidding to a halt as he noticed an unfamiliar device on the wall beside the banks of bubbling liquid. After three years of repairing and jury-rigging Ancient machinery, he was familiar with every crystal and control panel. He'd never seen this before. It looked almost like some kind of rack. It was holding small, wire devices in neat rows.

His heart skipped a beat as he noticed the plaque above the rack. Translating as well as he could without his laptop Ancient dictionary to consult, he read the message. As best as he could tell, it read: Do not enter the room of thought-test-experiment without proper protection.

Rodney took protection to mean the wire devices stacked below the sign.

He wondered if his team had touched or noticed the rack, but decided it was unlikely. They'd been focused on searching the room. None of them dealt with peripheral Ancient equipment enough to know what was and wasn't standard issue, and only Teyla could read Ancient.

The plaque blended into the wall so well that the only way it would be noticed was if someone were staring straight at the rack. Fat lot of good an invisible warning would do people, Rodney thought, wondering why the Ancients hadn't posted clearer hazard signs or instructions on dangerous technology. Although, upon reflection, Rodney realized that a primitive human might find modern Earth homes equally perilous.

As usual, there was nothing like an instruction manual anywhere near the rack. Taking down one of the tiny wire devices, he studied it, trying to determine how it functioned.

It started to glow in his hand, so he figured it must have been activated by his ATA gene. So, theoretically, the protection was working – if this was even what the sign had been referring to.

Well, there was nothing for it. Protected or unprotected, he had to rescue his team. Almost frantic when he realized how much time his friends had been in there, he turned to hurry for the door. His friends were in there unprotected. God knew what was happening to them.

Rodney's rush halted as a cheerful voice boomed out behind him.

"I wouldn't go in there just yet if I were you."

Rodney turned, his blood literally running cold when he saw the green-robed giant standing behind him. The being seemed to fill the corridor; he was so huge.

His heart started to race. Every instinct he owned was screaming that he turn and run. Except, the giant was blocking his way to the door to the outside. The only thing behind him was the door to the last room they hadn't investigated yet.

And, even if the being weren't blocking his escape; he couldn't just run off and leave the others.

For once, when he reached for his sidearm, it slid smoothly into his palm. The clip didn't even fall out this time. Thumbing off the safety, he forced his shaking hand to still as he demanded with as much threat as he could manage, which he knew wasn't very much, "What have you done to my friends?"

"I have done nothing to them," the giant responded.

Staring up at those strong, character-filled features, Rodney thought that the giant really did bear an uncanny resemblance to the actor who had played the Ghost of Christmas Present in Albert Finney's Scrooge. There was a kindness in those rugged features that made you want to trust him.

"Please put your weapon away. I mean you no harm," the giant continued.

"Not until you tell me what happened to my friends," Rodney insisted, keeping the gun focused on where he thought the giant's heart might be. The trembling in his hand was starting to take his whole body. For all the times he'd fired his 9 mil, he'd never actually shot anyone before, certainly not face to face like this. Ronon, Teyla, and Sheppard could intimidate as effortlessly as they drew breath. Rodney knew that he himself was simply not cut out for menacing people.

To his relief, the giant answered immediately. "As you guessed, they are in the room behind you."

"Why aren't they answering their radios?" Rodney asked, relaxing a little at how quickly the giant answered his question. The cynic in him reminded him that the alien could be lying. He had no way of knowing what the strange creature's motives might be. But, Rodney still couldn't help but feel better at the easy way the alien answered him.

"They entered the Room of Reflection unprotected. They are caught in webs of their minds' creation now," the giant said.

"They're what?" Rodney asked, trying to make sense of the creature's words. It didn't sound like his team was dead, but whatever had happened didn't sound pleasant. Realizing that the giant had prevented him from waltzing in and getting caught in whatever was waiting in there as well, Rodney slowly lowered his gun. "What's a Room of Reflection?"

"Long ago, my people were researching a means to move to a higher plane of being here. That room helped us attain that goal," the giant said.

"You're . . . you're an Ancient," Rodney said. Reading confusion on the giant's brown-bearded face, he quickly explained, "Your people built Atlantis and the stargates."

"You know of Atlantis?" the giant asked.

"It's our home now. My people came through the stargate from a planet called Earth in the Milky Way galaxy. We found the city deserted. It was resting on the ocean floor when we arrived," Rodney said.

"Atlantis was deserted?" the giant questioned.

"There was a great war with creatures called Wraith," Rodney began to explain.

"Yes. We were forced to stop our research on Ascension to work on a means to offer more power to defeat the enemy," the giant said.

The being's words confirmed everything he'd read in the outpost data banks. They went a long way in reassuring Rodney that he was dealing with a real Ancient here. Though, why the creature would take on this particular form was puzzling. He'd seen enough Ancients and representations of them to know that they didn't normally dress this dramatically.

"I'm sorry, but your people were never able to defeat the Wraith. The Pegasus galaxy was overwhelmed by them. Atlantis was the only stronghold the Wraith didn't breach. It was held under siege for years before your people decided to sink the city and escape through the stargate," Rodney said, hoping his words wouldn't anger the creature. He didn't know if he were dealing with an ascended Ancient here or the last survivor of the outpost. In either case, he didn't want to antagonize it. Chaya's destruction of the Wraith ships had shown him what ascended Ancients were capable of and his daily contact with Atlantis' technology had shown him what the un-ascended Ancients could do. He didn't want to make an enemy of either.

"That is why they never answered our signal," the Ancient said, his face reflecting his sorrow.

"Your signal only reached us this morning. We, uh, came to help," Rodney said.

The giant nodded. "That is most kind of you."

"That isn't your original form, is it?" Rodney's curiosity finally forced him to ask.

The giant gave a negative shake of his head. "I don't remember my original form. I drew this image from your mind and that of the Lantean in your group."

Rodney knew he should be angry at the intrusion, but there was something about the Ancient that made him feel that his secrets were safe. So, instead of reacting to the violation of his privacy, he echoed, "The Lantean?"

"The dark haired one you call Sheppard," the giant said.

"He's not Lantean. He's from Earth," Rodney protested.

"He is of my people. His genetic markers are pure Lantean," the giant said. "Your genetic markers have been manipulated to mimic those of my people, but his are pure."

Rodney sighed. No matter where they went, Sheppard had the magic touch. Not wanting to get into a discussion of how his artificial ATA gene was second-rate with this Ancient, he changed the subject with, "Getting back to our original topic, why did you choose that form in particular? There must have been thousands in our minds to choose from."

"So there were," the giant agreed. "This one most closely represents what I am. I have become one with this world now. This figure seemed to represent a benevolent winter spirit in both your minds. It seemed the most fitting choice."

Rodney remembered reading an SG1 report about an ascended Ancient who'd become an earth spirit. Oma De Sala, his brain finally remembered the name. She, too, had become one with the planet she was dwelling on and manifested herself as a force of nature.

Thinking of Oma Da Sala, he realized that he didn't know this Ancient's name. Feeling strange conversing with the Ancient without knowing what to call him, Rodney introduced himself, "Since you've read my mind, you probably know this already. I'm Dr. Rodney McKay. Do you have a name I can call you?"

"I was known to my people as Robur," the Ancient replied.

"Pleased to meet you, Robur," Rodney said with a touch of irony. Getting serious again, he asked, "Why was I the only one who could see you before?"

"I did not intend to reveal myself to any of you. When you first left your ship, I did not realize that you carried the Asuran mind weapon in your blood," Robur answered.

"The what?" Rodney asked, trying to hold down his panic. Was this Ancient warning him that the Replicators had infected him the same way they had Elizabeth when they'd been captured on Asura?

"The weapons were microscopic devices that attacked and destroyed the brains of non-Lantean humans," Robur explained.

"You're talking about nanites," Rodney realized at last.

"Yes."

"Are you saying I was infected again on Asura?" Rodney tried to hold back his fear, but even he could hear it in his voice. Waiting for his brain to explode was an event he never wanted to repeat.

A warmth seemed to pass through his thoughts, calming him. It took him a moment to realize that the Ancient was reading his mind.

"No. These are remnants of your original exposure on Atlantis," Robur said at last.

"Hey, you just . . . I'd appreciate it if you didn't go reading my mind without permission," Rodney tried to make it a request, rather than a demand. He was painfully aware that there was nothing he could do to prevent an ascended Ancient from doing anything it wanted with him.

"As you wish," the Ancient bowed his holly-wreathed head in acknowledgement.

"So how do these nanites let me see you?" Rodney's scientific curiosity forced him to ask. "I mean, they've been deactivated . . . haven't they?"

"They're no longer functional, but they ran their course before your people deactivated them. Your brain was affected. None of the others in your group seem to have been exposed to the Asuran mind weapon, so they could not see me," the giant said.

"What do you mean 'my brain was affected'? Are you saying these things caused some kind of brain damage?" Carson had given him a CAT scan and MRI after the nanite incident to reassure him that he was perfectly healthy, but Rodney knew there were a million things those microscopic time bombs could have done to him that Earth medicine didn't have the technology to diagnose.

"Not brain damage, per se. Because of the directive written into the Asuran base code programming, they could do nothing to harm anyone bearing the Lantean gene. To fulfill this programming, they had to design their weapon so that it had a positive effect on the Lanteans who might fall prey to it. Rather than destroying your brain, the Asuran mind weapon activated an area of your mind that most un-ascended humans rarely use. The changes are nothing you would notice in your daily activities."

"What type of changes are we talking about here?" Rodney demanded, still panicking.

"Activation of that area of your brain would make you less susceptible to mental manipulation. You would be less prone to hallucinations or other visual aberrations than Lanteans and humans who had not suffered the Asuran weapon's effects," Robur said.

"That can't be right," Rodney said. "I had a hell of an hallucination when I was trapped in a jumper at the bottom of the ocean last year."

Rodney found that he was almost disappointed to find Robur proven wrong. He was all for augmenting his mental facilities any way possible. It was petty as hell, but for a moment there, it was sounding like he had some special ability that even Sheppard with his magic gene didn't have.

"You refer to that incident where a colleague from your homeworld appeared to you to help you in a time of great need?" Robur asked.

"Hey, I thought we agreed you weren't going to read my thoughts," Rodney reminded.

"I did not read them now. I detected this memory when I scanned you earlier," Robur said.

"Oh," Rodney said, slightly mollified.

"Is that the incident to which you refer?" Robur questioned. At Rodney's nod of assent, the Ancient continued, "You were not hallucinating in that event."

"Well, Sam Carter sure as hell didn't teleport herself to the Pegasus galaxy to save me. When I mentioned it to her, she had no idea what I was talking about," Rodney said, remembering that embarrassing conversation.

"Nevertheless, you were not hallucinating. Rather, you experienced an encounter very similar to the one you are experiencing at this moment," Robur said.

"An encounter?" Rodney questioned, having no clue as to what the Ancient could be referring. "Are you saying an Ancient . . . ?" Abruptly, he remembered that Morgan Le Fay had been hiding out in Atlantis as a holographic interface for who knew how long. "Morgan Le Fay was hiding on Atlantis. Are you saying she helped me?"

"No. It wasn't an ascended Lantean. The creature you called a whale that kept circling your wrecked ship was a member of a sentient race aligned to my people. It saw your plight and did what it could to assist you," Robur said.

"You're saying that was real? That I wasn't hallucinating?" Rodney asked. The whale had been intelligent . . . and it had helped him? That was more than could be said for most of the ascended Ancients they'd met. Aside from Chaya, who hadn't been too good at the neutrality thing, most of the ascended Ancients were frighteningly cold-blooded when it came to honoring their non-intervention directives.

"Did it feel like an hallucination?" Robur asked.

"No, it felt as real as you do," Rodney said.

"Then why do you doubt it?"

"I don't know. I guess it just never occurred to me that the whale was intelligent."

"There are many things you do not know about the Pegasus galaxy," Robur replied, with that know-it-all air the Ancients had.

"Yeah, well, that's what we're here for – to explore and learn," Rodney said and then tried to return the conversation to its original course, "So the Asuran device really did augment my brain?" At the giant's nod, Rodney said, "That's why I wasn't as affected as Sheppard and Ronon on M1B129 when that Wraith device was messing with everyone's' heads."

"Yes."

The mention of his teammates reminded him as to why he was here talking to this ascended Ancient. "Oh, my god. I got so caught up talking to you that I forgot about my team." Remembering what Robur had said to him, he asked, "Why did you warn me not to go into that room?"

"When your companions entered, the Lantean's genes activated the machine in there. They were not wearing protection and were trapped in its field," Robur answered, gesturing towards the rack of wire-like devices by the door.

"What's it doing to them?" Rodney asked. Even he could hear the note of fear in his voice.

"It was originally designed as an aid to Ascension. It helps searchers identify what areas they need to work on to reach the next plane of being. When your companions walked in there, they found themselves confronted by their deepest fear."

"So I just have to use this protective device and go in there and turn the machine off?" Rodney asked, holding up the wire device.

"I'm afraid it is not that easy. Were you to turn the machine off while they were trapped in it, their minds would be irreparably damaged. The Room of Reflection was designed as an instruction tool. Each searcher had a mentor who would oversee their explorations. When the searcher encountered the kind of difficulties your companions are presently experiencing, the mentor would enter the reality created by the machine to guide them through the trial. If you wish to save your companions, you will have to act as mentor to them."

Rodney ran a nervous hand over his face. He'd never had the patience for mentoring anybody. His few attempts at tutoring had been complete disasters. His team's lives were at stake here. This was too important to chance to his personality faults. "I'm not what you'd call mentoring material. I know you Ascended Ancients have all kinds of amazing abilities. Couldn't you just . . . you know, teleport them out of there or something?"

"I regret that is not possible. That would be direct interference," Robur said.

"Well, what do you call what you're doing now? You stopped me from going in there. You told me what's happened to my friends. How is that not interfering?" Rodney demanded, beginning to understand the frustrations Daniel Jackson had spoken about concerning his dealings with ascended Ancients the few times they'd discussed the subject.

"I merely called you. I did not physically stop you. You could have kept going and entered the Room of Reflection. I did not tell you anything you would not have learned from the outpost's computers," Robur said.

"That sounds a hell of a lot like a qualification," Rodney said.

"Perhaps," Robur agreed.

Belatedly realizing that he still needed this creature's help, Rodney tried to soften his tone as he asked, "So, uh, how do I help them?"

"Before entering, you must place the unit on your ear." Robur explained. "It will prevent you from being drawn into your own test. To act as mentor to your companions, you need merely touch them while wearing that unit. It will bring you into whatever reality they are experiencing. Once you help them defeat whatever challenge they are facing, you will both be returned to your bodies."

"What kind of challenges are we talking about here?" Rodney asked, feeling a little like he was preparing for a Dungeons and Dragons game. Robur certainly fit the role of Dungeon Master better than any of the pimple-faced high school and college kids Rodney had played with. He couldn't help but wonder what kind of experience points his three years on Atlantis would earn him.

"That depends on what your companions fear most," Robur said.

"What happens if I can't guide them out of their challenge?"

"That would be most unfortunate. The only way for the searcher to escape is to conquer the challenge. Should they fail, they will remain locked in whatever reality their minds have created until their bodies succumb to starvation," Robur explained.

"What kind of sense is that?" Rodney demanded. "What is wrong with you people? Who makes a machine like that?"

"The Room of Reflection was not to be entered lightly. It was the final step on a difficult journey. Only those who were willing to risk their lives entered the room as a searcher."

"Did you?" Rodney questioned.

Robur nodded. "Long ago."

Realizing that there was one issue he hadn't addressed, Rodney asked, "Er, what happens to the mentor if the searcher fails his challenge?"

"Nothing. As long as you wear the protective unit, you can extract yourself from the challenge any time you choose," Robur said. "But be warned. These events are real to your companions. What befalls them there, could very well influence them for the rest of their lives."

"However short those lives might be," Rodney muttered. "Okay. I need to get started. How do I . . . ?"

His robes rustling around him, Robur walked to the rack on the wall beside the door and extracted one of the wire devices. Once again, Rodney was struck by how much Robur resembled the Dickens character. Watching this fairytale character move, he wondered what he'd see if those flowing, green robes should part. Would the two starving children from the Dickens story be hiding beneath them? Was the verisimilitude that exact?

As Robur stood in front of the rack, Rodney couldn't help but notice that the Ancient glowed so bright that he turned the wall a warm, golden yellow when he stood close to it.

"Place this over your ear, like so." Moving his long, dark curls and holly wreath aside, Robur demonstrated how the wire hooked around the ear. "The Lantean gene you carry will activate it. To mentor a challenge, just touch whichever of your companions you choose to help first. To withdraw, concentrate on extracting yourself."

"If I'm able to help them, what happens then?" Rodney asked.

"Your companions will return to their bodies unharmed, or ascend to the next level if they are ready," Robur said.

Like that was really going to happen with this group, Rodney thought.

"Okay, I'm going in," Rodney announced once he had the protective device resting around his ear. Remembering his manners, he added, "Er, thanks for your help, Robur."

"May you help your friends find their paths," Robur offered in the tone of a benediction.

"I just want to get them out," Rodney said. Giving the Ancient a nod, he hurried into the room.

The Room of Reflection's doors parted as accommodatingly as those of his quarters back on Atlantis.

Rodney's hurried steps stumbled to a halt as he took in the scenario before him. The room lacked the Ancient's normal lighting. But it was hardly dark. Rainbows of shifting lights, bright as lasers, filled the place.

He'd felt like this the one time he'd visited a disco in the eighties. The room was that disorienting. Most of it was cloaked in shadows, except for the brilliant device pulsing in the center of the chamber. He saw his team as soon as he stepped through the door.

Ronon, Teyla and Sheppard were standing a few feet apart from each other. Their eyes were wide open as they stared unblinkingly at the machine in the center of the room. The shifting, colored lights reflected off their eerily vacant features. The Santa cap Ronon was wearing looked particularly incongruous, almost sinister in this alien setting.

Rodney couldn't help but think that his teammates looked like they'd been frozen in time by some kind of enchantment; they were that still.

Even if they hadn't been under the machine's influence, Rodney wouldn't have blamed them for staring at it. The Ancient device was magnificent. It rose about four feet from the floor in the familiar, vaguely cylindrical console pattern common to Ancient technology. But there was nothing common about the device's effect. The light show it was emitting was so incredibly compelling, it was almost hypnotic.

Considering its effects on his team, there was really no questioning its properties. The device clearly was hypnotic. He wondered how the wire on his ear was blocking its signal.

Looking at the unit, Rodney remembered an old SG1 mission report that had mentioned a similar machine. The one on the Go'ould world had been purely for recreational purposes and had snared the entire SG1 team with its addictive spell before they'd realized what was going on.

Not that the Go'ould had created the device. They were scavengers of technology, rather than inventors. No doubt, it was an Ancient machine the Go'ould had stumbled upon and converted to their own uses. Rodney couldn't help but wonder if that machine on the Go'ould world P4X-347 had been the precursor of this one or vice versa. The only thing he did know for certain was that the Go'ould hadn't been using it for purposes of spiritual enlightenment.

Like what was happening to his friends was enlightenment, Rodney's mind sneered as he took in his frozen teammates.

The whole idea of this Room of Reflection was bewildering. Enlightenment that captured and threatened the lives of unsuspecting intergalactic explorers just seemed wrong to him. He didn't get spiritual enlightenment that killed if the person wasn't ready for advancement. But, then, he didn't get the concept of religion to start with.

As with most everything else that had happened since he'd first stepped through the stargate, this situation wasn't going to give him the luxury of waiting until he understood it. Just like always, he was going to have to fix some impossible problem with lives hanging in the balance. That it was the lives of his team depending on his ability to accomplish the impossible only made the pressure worse.

Knowing he had to get started, he took a deep breath and approached the person nearest him. That was Ronon. The lights were still tinting Ronon's bearded face a spectrum of colors and playing over that stupid cap in an unnerving manner.

Rodney reached out to lay his palm on the tunic covering Ronon's elbow . . . and the world seemed to blink out of being around him for a moment. When reality reformed around him, the Room of Reflection was gone.

Rodney shivered as he recognized the shadowed, blue-lighted room around him as the cocoon room on a Wraith hive. It was like that crashed supply ship they'd found that time they were investigating Gaul's Ancient satellite. Red support struts, purple walls, webs everywhere. All of the humans wrapped in the cocoons were long dead, nothing but dried out husks.

As usual, the webbing in the cocoons, the organic, honeycomb-like structure of the walls, the organic foundation of the Wraith ship, and the web-like dividers shielding the doors gave the place a creepy, inimical, insectoid feel. As if the dead bodies decorating the chamber weren't enough to freak anyone out in themselves, Rodney thought.

A crash sounded behind him, and he turned to see Ronon battling that huge monster of a Wraith that had fought Ronon on Sateda. The thing was just as ugly now as then, and just as unstoppable.

From the blood and sweat sheathing Ronon, it was clear he'd been fighting for some time.

Rodney gasped at the ease with which the Wraith tossed Ronon against the nearest cocoon. Ronon went down like a rock. The husk of the body in the catacomb Ronon crashed into fell to the floor with him.

The contents of Rodney's stomach lurched upwards as he watched Ronon struggle to free himself from the body on top of him. The corpse had been dead so long that its limbs detached from its torso when Ronon shoved at it. That had to be as terrifying as having the Wraith come at you, Rodney thought. Or maybe not. The corpse wasn't going to suck the life out of Ronon the way the approaching Wraith would.

For a moment, Rodney stood frozen in place, shocked and staring at what was happening. As the Wraith towering over his teammate reached down towards Ronon's chest, Rodney came to his senses.

Instinct had him reaching for his sidearm. His fingers found nothing but his uniform there. His gun and his holster were missing. In retrospect, he realized that it made sense. Spiritual enlightenment through firepower was something Sheppard would endorse; it wasn't a particularly Ancienty approach. Of course, the machine wouldn't allow him to bring a weapon through, which left him here facing a Wraith with nothing but the clothes on his back.

He abruptly realized that he'd never asked what would happen if the mentor were killed by a figment of the searcher's imagination during the test. Knowing how they'd built their damn machines, Rodney figured that both mentor and searcher would probably buy it if the mentor couldn't master the challenge. But how in the hell was he supposed to help Ronon through this?

Rodney had no delusions about his physical abilities. He was worse at hand to hand than he was at shooting.

Every self-preservation impulse he had was screaming for him to extract himself from this nightmare. If someone like Ronon couldn't take the Wraith, what was a braincase like him going to do to stop it?

Brain . . . he needed to use his brain. Rodney's eyes desperately searched the cocoon room for anything he could convert into a weapon, but these chambers had been designed as holding areas. There weren't any consoles or conduits for him to tinker with, nothing but line upon line of dead bodies. And even if there had been some kind of machine here, there simply wasn't time. The Wraith was about to feed on Ronon.

"This time you're mine," the Wraith taunted Ronon in a triumphant tone, his foot planted in the center of Ronon's wide chest, holding him down on the floor as Ronon struggled to free himself. All Wraith were scary looking, but some of the breeding males had an elegant sleekness to their deadly visages that the warrior drones lacked. Steve and Michael had been almost handsome in a life-sucking way. But not this one. This one was big, ugly, and mean-looking, everything a monster should be. "I have fed on all of those from your homeworld. You are the last. No one is coming to save you this time. The last of your pathetic line will die here, and no one will know or care."

This was what Ronon feared most, Rodney realized. It only made sense. After all those years as a Runner, fighting every single day simply to survive, Ronon's greatest fear would have to be falling prey to the bastards hunting him.

The Wraith's last words, 'no one will know or care' seemed to echo through the gruesome chamber for a long time.

Something snapped inside Rodney at that. He didn't know what he could do against a demon like the Wraith unarmed as he was, but Ronon was sure as hell not going to die believing that no one cared.

Not allowing himself time to think and panic, Rodney charged the Wraith in a full body tackle like one of the guys in Sheppard's stupid football tapes. It felt like he ran straight into a stone wall. He was sure he felt an arm break. But, to his utter shock, he also felt the Wraith go down beneath him.

Rodney knew he probably would never have been able to budge the Wraith if it had been standing with both feet planted firmly on the floor. He'd seen how effortlessly this Wraith had deflected Ronon's flying attack on Sateda. But the monster was already unbalanced, standing as he was with his foot on Ronon's chest. When Rodney hit him, the Wraith went down like a ton of bricks.

The Wraith recovered with frightening speed. Rodney was still dazed from the collision when he felt hands as strong as iron grip his arms. Next thing he knew, he was flat on his back on the floor. The Wraith was above him, that deadly hand rushing towards his chest.

Rodney was too terrified to even voice the scream inside him. He was pinned down, helpless. He was going to die here and . . . .

An outraged, primal roar filled the chamber.

Rodney opened his eyes, just in time to see a pair of blood-smeared hands grip either side of the Wraith's head and give a powerful twist. There was the sickening sound of bone snapping. Absolute shock filled the Wraith's face in the second Rodney had to absorb its expression, then the Wraith's head was spinning like Linda Blair's in the Exorcist as Ronon killed the monster.

The Wraith started to fall forward on top of Rodney, but Ronon pushed the body to the side and it toppled to the floor beside Rodney instead of crushing him.

Shaking all over, Rodney forced himself to sit up.

For once, Ronon looked as freaked out as Rodney himself felt. His teammate was just kneeling there, covered in dirt and blood, panting to catch his breath, staring at Rodney with an expression that seemed to suggest that Ronon couldn't believe what he was seeing.

"You came," Ronon said at last in that deep growling voice of his that used to scare the hell out of Rodney when Ronon had first joined the team.

"Sorry it took so long," Rodney apologized, Ronon's bruises and cuts telling him just how long and hard the fight had been.

"How did we get here?" Ronon asked. "The last thing I remember, we were checking out an Ancient lab. Next thing I know, I'm here on a hiveship fighting for my life."

"This isn't real," Rodney explained. "It's a virtual environment created by the Ancient device in the last room you were exploring. You and the others got trapped. I came to help."

"It's not real?" Ronon asked.

Rodney couldn't blame him for doubting. The hiveship around them was a perfect replica.

"No, it's just a very clever virtual creation."

"Virtual or not . . . ." Ronon's gaze moved to the dead Wraith. "Thank you. I . . . ."

Reading how shaken Ronon still was from the emotion in his usually stoic face, Rodney quickly said, "It's okay."

"You took on a Wraith to help me," Ronon sounded shocked.

"I can't believe I did it myself," Rodney admitted, staring at the monster the pair of them had managed to kill together.

"That was . . . ." Words seemed to fail Ronon for a moment. "You could have been killed."

Supremely self-conscious, Rodney tried to shrug off what he'd done. "I knew you'd save me."

He'd known nothing of the kind, but Ronon didn't have to know that.

"How do we get out of here?" Ronon asked, sinking down to sit beside Rodney and the dead Wraith.

"I'm not sure," Rodney said.

The fact that they were still here in the hiveship instead of back in the Room of Reflection was troubling Rodney. As he'd understood it, the machine was supposed to return them to their bodies as soon as they passed the challenge. Only, maybe they hadn't passed the challenge. Robur had said that the machine was intended to help a person master the fears that were holding them back from Ascension. Killing a Wraith didn't necessarily kill the fear of the Wraith.

"Why would the Ancients build a machine to bring people to a hiveship?" Ronon questioned after a long silence.

"The machine was used as a tool in Ascension. It helped a person confront and conquer their deepest fear," Rodney said.

After a long pause, Ronon gave a self-conscious, "Oh. So, you're saying I . . . ."

"Yeah," Rodney tried to make it sound like it were no big deal. Even in the weird blue light, he could see how Ronon's cheeks were warming with embarrassment beneath the blood and grime on them.

Rodney could sympathize. He knew how he'd be feeling if Ronon were sitting here witnessing the thing he feared most. Of course, in his case, there were so many things he feared that Rodney wasn't sure what the scenario would be. All he knew was that it would be embarrassing for someone to witness it and know that was what he feared most.

A tense silence fell between them. Ronon sat there still breathing heavy from the exertion of his battle, while Rodney was just glad to be breathing.

When some time had passed and the hiveship showed no sign of dematerializing around them, Rodney realized that they were going to have to do something to get themselves out.

"Should we try to steal a dart?" Ronon suggested at the same moment Rodney had opened his mouth to say something on the subject of getting out of the VE.

"And go where? This is a virtual environment," Rodney snapped.

"So how do we get out of it?" Ronon demanded, impatience and exasperation clear in his tone and face.

Rodney sighed. He remembered Robur telling him that he would have to mentor his teammates through whatever they were facing. Apparently, killing the grand-daddy of all Wraith wasn't enough to impress those damn Ancients. To get out of here, Ronon and he were going to have to tackle something even scarier – talking about feelings, or, in this case, fears.

Ronon's main fear was obviously dying at the Wraith's hands, with no one knowing or caring. Considering what the guy had gone through as a Runner, it made perfect sense. Rodney wondered where that left him mentor-wise. How was a mentor supposed to help someone conquer a fear that was based in reality? As much as the other expedition members often behaved as if they believed he could accomplish anything, Rodney knew he wasn't omnipotent. How could he possibly convince Ronon that the Wraith would never get him? There were days Rodney couldn't even convince himself of that fact.

He couldn't promise Ronon that the Wraith would never kill him. No one could make that kind of promise. So, where did that leave them – stuck here in the hivehship for the rest of eternity? What kind of sense was that?

Rodney picked at the problem mentally, taking it apart the way he would a difficult math equation. Okay, the main fear couldn't be conquered. But what about the dependent clauses, the dying alone and no one caring? Maybe those could be helped.

He wished Sheppard were here. Sheppard would know exactly what to say to help Ronon, and Ronon would believe him, the way everyone believed Sheppard. Or Teyla, whose tranquil presence inspired trust and confidence. Both of them would know what to say to make this right. Rodney hadn't a clue. But he was the only one here, so it was up to him to do what he could.

Strangely enough, even though he knew he could extract himself from the scene any time he wanted, leaving Ronon alone wasn't a viable option.

Taking a deep breath, Rodney plunged ahead. He didn't know how to lead up to what he wanted to say, so he just said it with his usual blunt forwardness. "Whatever happens, you won't be alone."

"What?" Ronon said, focusing on him through swollen eyes. The other man seemed to tense up at Rodney's words.

"There's no way anyone can promise that the Wraith won't kill you," Rodney said in a self-conscious rush. "It would be a lie if I even tried to say that. But I can promise you that whatever happens, we'll be right there with you. If the Wraith steal you again, we'll find you just like we did before. And, if we all get taken, which, seriously, is the far more likely scenario, then we'll die with you. But whatever happens, I promise you, you won't be facing it alone."

Feeling completely awkward, because he knew he sucked at this kind of thing, Rodney reached out to lay his hand on the torn tunic covering Ronon's arm.

As soon as he touched Ronon, the hiveship around them wavered. Instead of the frightening blue Wraith light, they found themselves in a chamber filled with a rainbow of color.

"What . . . ?" Ronon gasped beside him.

Ronon was wearing that goofy Santa cap again. Rodney had never been so happy to see one of the stupid things in his life. Ronon's bruises were gone and his clothes were intact.

Rodney nearly collapsed with relief as he realized he'd done it. They were back in the Room of Reflection.

"We did it!" Rodney all but crowed with glee. "We're back in the Ancient outpost!"

Ronon's grin faded as his gaze moved around the room. "What's wrong with Teyla and Sheppard?"

Rodney turned towards their other two teammates, who were still frozen like statues. "They're still trapped in the machine."

"How do we get them out?" Ronon asked.

"The same way I got you out," Rodney answered.

"Oh. What can I do?" Ronon was still looking a little pale from his own ordeal, but he was obviously willing to do whatever he had to to help their friends.

Rodney considered the idea of telling him to go outside and put on one of the protective devices to help the others, but then he realized that it wouldn't be fair to Ronon. The man had just faced down his own demons. He didn't need to face someone else's right away.

"Guard the door?" Rodney suggested, knowing that there was no way Ronon would accept the idea of resting while Teyla and Sheppard were still in danger.

"All right," Ronon agreed. "Will you be okay?"

Rodney wasn't sure. What just happened might have been virtual, but he still felt as if he'd almost been fed upon by a Wraith. All he wanted to do was crawl up in a ball for a while. But Teyla and John were still trapped, and there was no way he could leave them facing the kind of situation he'd just pulled Ronon out of. Somehow, he forced a smile and lied, "I'll be fine."

"Don’t worry about the ghost," Ronon said, withdrawing his pistol and thumbing it to the kill setting. "I'll keep watch."

About to explain Robur, Rodney shut his mouth. It would take too long, and, well, even if Ronon saw Robur, there was very little chance that he'd be able to harm an ascended Ancient. "Thanks."

His face going strangely gentle, Ronon said, "No. Thank you. What you did was very brave."

Rodney snorted. "What I did was very stupid, but you're welcome."

With a nod, Ronon walked to the door to keep guard.

Rodney collected himself as best as he could, and then moved to Teyla, who was closest. He reached out and laid his hand on her arm, and, once again, reality wavered around him. The Room of Reflection winked out of being. In its place stood a primitive village. It was night and the village was in flames.

Rodney instantly recognized the huge white tents as those of the Athosians on the mainland. Most of them were burning or collapsed.

There were Wraith darts whining overhead, and off in the other end of the village, Rodney could hear the shrieks of the dying.

He ducked under a nearby tree so he wouldn't be visible from above.

As he moved in his blind panic, he stumbled over something. Looking down, his gut clenched up tight when he saw the corpse of a man whose height and hair style matched Halling's. His face, though, was decades older. In the flickering, hellish light of the fires consuming the tents, Rodney could see Halling's face all too clearly. The grimace frozen on his prematurely aged features showed that the man had died in agony. His right hand was extended on the ground beside him, as if he'd been reaching for something even as he died.

That something turned out to be another body.

Rodney's throat tightened up when he saw the smaller remains of what had once been an adolescent boy lying on the dirt beside Halling. It could only be Jinto. He, too, had been fed upon by the Wraith.

Rodney was staring down in shock at the corpses when he heard the distinctive sound of the Wraith dematerialization beam. Then six darts flew by overhead. He watched them disappear behind the forest tree line.

There was no more screaming from the other end of the village. The only sound in the sudden silence was the roar of the burning tents and wood and other substances popping and collapsing as they were consumed in the flames.

Scared out of his mind, Rodney started walking through the burning village of corpses, searching for Teyla.

Something seemed to break inside him as he stared down at a tiny form on the ground outside the smoking remains of a collapsed tent. A rag doll lay on the dirt beside the small body. The child was as dead as the others. The kid didn't look older than three. As prematurely aged as the child was, he couldn't even tell if it had been a boy or gir