Title: Summit of Courage
Characters: Sheppard, Teyla, McKay, Ronon, Ford...
Word Count: ~18,000
Spoilers: Up through Runner, Season 2 (and specifically for Thirty-Eight Minutes, Season 1)
Summary: Let's just say the working title for this was "Iratus Bug Incident, the Second."
Huge thanks to![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif)
everybetty for the beta. I wrote this really fast and have been pretty nervous about it, so thank you to all those who offered encouragement along the way. The story is complete but still needs a bit more editing - I'll post as I get each section finalized. Hope you enjoy it!
Summit of Courage
Chapter 1
The world was enshrouded in mystery. Well, fog, but John Sheppard liked to think it made this world more of an enigma, and a routine exploratory mission much more exciting. The gate had been situated in a narrow valley, high up in jagged, rocky mountains. A path cut through the mountains, and John had led the way, wondering who could possibly live in such terrain.
The mountains, what he could see of them anyway, were the epitome of rugged. There was hardly any vegetation, just sheer cliffs of stone jutting up and disappearing into gray overcast skies. The path weaved around rock walls and steep crevasses and it was impossible to tell if anyone had used it recently. The clouds seemed to be descending with them, swirling around the path and filling rocky gorges.
It could have been desolate. Some people might think so anyway, but it was exactly how John imagined the high mountains in Pakistan looked like at their peaks. For all he knew, maybe he was descending from this world’s version of K2—that would be something to write about.
John rounded a corner and came to sudden halt. He could hear his teammates’ feet scraping behind him on the path, and then they too stopped.
“What is it?” McKay whispered. They’d been quiet since the moment they stepped foot on the planet. Something about the fog and the low visibility, the gray light seeping through the cloud cover—it subdued everything, even sounds.
“Tree,” John replied. He stared at the gnarled branches of the small tree, wondering how the hell it had found a way to survive and grow in the rocky terrain. It looked dead now—not a single leaf on it—but it had been alive once, and lived long enough to grow its five or six feet.
“Dead tree. Why are we here again? There’s nothing here,” McKay said, giving the tree a disgruntled look.
“We’re explorers, McKay. We’re exploring. It’s what we do.”
John saw McKay roll his eyes and heard Ronon grunt behind him. He wondered what the tall man was thinking. They’d done some training on Atlantis together, but technically, this was their first real mission through the stargate. Ronon had military experience, was in excellent physical shape, and could blow the hell out of anything with that gun of his. John didn’t know him well enough to read him yet, but he had to admit, the man had style. Just what his team needed.
They kept walking. The air was deathly still and carried a damp chill. It smelled like it was going to rain, but that could be related to the fact that they were walking through a cloud.
“Reminds me of K2,” John suddenly said.
“K2? Really? You’ve climbed K2?” McKay asked.
“What’s K2?”
John threw a glance back at Ronon. “It’s a mountain on Earth.”
“A really big mountain. The second highest on the entire planet actually,” McKay chimed in.
“People call it the Savage Mountain because it’s so hard to ascend. In fact, I read somewhere that one out of every four people who reach the summit dies.”
“What is at the summit, that so many would risk their lives?” Teyla asked, her voice floating in the still air.
“There’s nothing at the summit—just the summit itself. They climb it for the challenge, just to say they’ve done it. It’s one of the hardest things you can do on Earth.”
“And you climbed this K2?” Ronon asked.
John thought he detected a hint of admiration or respect in the man’s voice, and he cringed a little at his answer. “Well, no, not exactly. Thought about trying it, though, if the Air Force would let me.”
“Sounds horrible to me,” McKay muttered. “Altitude sickness, hypoxia, nausea, rock slides, avalanches, death—not to mention the physical exertion of dragging your body up a rock just to see…more rocks.”
“It’s an accomplishment, something only a handful of people have ever done.”
“And you would like to do this someday?” Teyla asked.
John shrugged. “Yeah, maybe. Actually, when I was young, I wanted to climb Mount Kilimanjaro in Africa more than anything.”
“Is that one big?” Ronon asked.
“Highest peak in Africa,” John answered.
“That’s a continent on Earth,” McKay filled in before anyone could ask. The path had widened out a little, and John spotted a few clumps of grass. They were descending gradually but steadily and he tried to gauge how far they’d come. Coming down was easy, but they’d have to hike back up when they were ready to go home.
“When I was in high school, I read The Snows of Kilimanjaro, by Hemingway,” John said, sidestepping a loose stone in the middle of the path. “I became obsessed with Africa, and everything I could find about Kilimanjaro… ‘wide as all the world, great, high, and unbelievably white in the sun.’”
The quoted words drifted off into the fog and John remembered the days spent in his local library, reading everything he could find about the distant, exotic mountain. He’d written up lists and lists of supplies and expenses and exercise routines, like he could have actually talked his father into letting him make such a trip.
“The snows of Kilimanjaro/ should I come home to the sea/ may I follow the jaguar/ climbing alone snow and high mountain/ and rest there.”
John turned around in surprise at McKay, who was staring off into the foggy wall off the path, lost in his own thoughts. “What’s that from?” he asked, hearing McKay’s words echoing again in his mind and remembering what he’d felt when he’d first read about the mountain and dreamed of ascending its peak.
“Uh, poem or something,” McKay answered. “Can’t remember where I heard it…by Maria-something.”
Ronon was watching McKay, his dark eyes sharp and bright, and John was once again struck by how little he knew the man. What was he thinking? Was he impressed by them, or did he think their ideas of high accomplishment were ridiculous, given what he’d already been through?
More clumps of grass appeared, then small trees, the leaves clinging to the small branches in desperation. The path descended steeply through a narrow ravine, and the team spread out behind John as they all carefully picked their way down. They’d been walking for over an hour now but had yet to see any signs of human existence on this world.
The bottom of the narrow ravine opened up into a wide, flat valley. At least John assumed it was a valley. The clouds were too thick to see very far. Through the fog, John could make out clusters of trees. His skin was covered in a light coat of moisture from the clouds, and he rubbed his hands together to work some warmth back into his fingertips.
A snap off to his right had him spinning at the sound, his eyes straining to see through the thick mist. He fingered his P90, not wanting to overreact but also not wanting to be caught unaware. The rest of his team had stopped and were staring into the bank of white haze.
“McKay, anything on the lifesigns detector?” he asked quietly, cringing a little at how loudly his voice seemed to carry all of a sudden.
He could hear the scientist digging through his pockets to pull out the Ancient device, cursing under his breath. John couldn’t quite make out what the man was muttering, but it sounded like it had something to do with why he hadn’t checked it right away and a probable impending death. The valley had grown motionless and quiet again, but it felt different this time, like the place was holding its breath, preparing for whatever was about to come next.
John had just turned away from the sound when he heard a soft grunt from the same direction. He glanced back just in time to catch a glimpse of something dark and furry digging at the roots of a slightly less dead-looking tree less than fifteen feet away from them. It was about the size of a dog, but its front legs were long and thin like the arms of a monkey, and its head was huge and flat and decidedly bear-like from behind.
And then the fog shifted again, obscuring his view. It was just an animal though, and not very big at that. John took a deep breath and lowered his gun, signaling the others to do the same. He turned around, taking another step down the path.
This time the growl was much louder and deeper, and coming from somewhere up ahead of him. He froze, feeling his heart thud in his chest as the first inklings of dread pumped through his veins. A patch of white fog floated across the path, and John blinked his eyes against the moisture.
Something dark and large—very large—was moving through the whiteness in front of him. He could almost hear the soft pats of feet pounding into the stone floor. The fog shifted again, and an animal appeared directly in front of him. It looked exactly like the one digging in the tree roots, only a good four or five times larger. It had been running toward the smaller animal, but it shifted its bulky weight with surprising agility and bore down straight toward John when he suddenly became visible.
Mama Bear.
“Ah, crap,” John hissed, scrambling for his weapon, but he knew there was no way he’d get it up in time.
.
.
.
“John?”
“Sheppard? Can you hear me?”
“John, please answer.”
“Colonel?”
John blinked open heavy eyes and stared at the white mist that swirled and twisted as it spoke.
“John?”
“I can climb down there.”
“What are you, nuts? We don’t know how far down it goes?”
The voice wove around the haze, and John twisted his head, trying to make sense of it.
“Sheppard?”
He recognized that voice—McKay.
“McKay?” he called out, his voice sounding much rougher than he expected. He coughed, trying to work some moisture back into his mouth.
“Oh, thank God,” the physicist mumbled from somewhere up above him.
John pushed himself up to a sitting position, feeling bruised muscles pull along his ribcage. His entire body ached, but nothing was screaming too loudly. He vaguely remembered getting head-butted by the charging animal, stumbling backward until suddenly there was no ground beneath his feet.
“You guys okay?” he called up. They didn’t answer immediately, and John felt a wave of panic.
“We are fine,” Teyla finally answered, and John let out the breath he hadn’t realized he was holding. “Are you badly injured?”
John continued to sit, taking a moment to gather himself. “I’m okay,” he answered, and again heard McKay muttering something above him. He realized he must not have fallen that far. Lucky. “What happened to that animal?”
“It ran off the path after it hit you,” Ronon answered. “It’s gone now.”
John nodded, relieved, and rolled to his feet. As he pushed himself up, he grunted at a sharp stab of pain in his ankle.
“Are you okay? What’s wrong? Are you bleeding?” McKay’s panicked voice erupted above him.
John must have grunted more loudly than he thought. He leaned against the wall, letting his ankle hang in the air for a few seconds. It hurt, but not terribly. It couldn’t be more than a sprain.
“Must have twisted my ankle when I fell.”
“Twisted, he says. That’s ‘broken’ in Colonel-speak, by the way.”
“It’s not broken, McKay,” John snapped. He looked up the side of the rocky gorge, guessing he only had to climb about fifteen feet up. The fog was thick down here and the visibility poor, but the wall looked jagged enough to provide hand and foot holds all the way up.
“You need any help, Sheppard?” Ronon asked.
“Nope, I got it. A little mountain climbing should do the trick.” He reached up for the first handholds as he spoke and was happy to see the mist thin out and the worried faces of his team staring down at him. He’d been right on—they weren’t more than fifteen feet above him.
He stuck his foot in a small crease in the wall and stepped up. The entire side of the gorge was covered in small holes and rock outcroppings. Climbing this would be a piece of cake, hardly a fair test of his mountain climbing skills. He paused a moment to see how much weight his ankle could handle and was pleased when it held all of his weight with nothing more than an angry twinge.
He really had been lucky tumbling down this little rocky gorge. Things could have been much, much worse. Ronon stared down at him, almost smiling as John worked his way up the side, but again John couldn’t quite read the man’s expression. Teyla’s face creased in concern every time he reached for a new handhold, and McKay yelled out a litany of curses and helpful suggestions so fast John wondered if the man was going to pass out from lack of oxygen.
He was about halfway up when he heard a twittering, clicking sound just above his head. He looked up in time to see Rodney and Teyla’s eyes both go round with fear, and Ronon suddenly rip his gun out of his holster to point it directly at John’s head. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw something black and shiny twitching in one of the holes in the cliff wall, dark beady eyes glistening back at him. There was a flash of orange, and the distinct shape of the creature that had haunted his nightmares for over a year now.
He would have screamed if he’d had the breath to. Instead he froze, his eyes locked with that of the Iratus bug’s. And then the insect leapt.
TBC...
Chapter 2
Characters: Sheppard, Teyla, McKay, Ronon, Ford...
Word Count: ~18,000
Spoilers: Up through Runner, Season 2 (and specifically for Thirty-Eight Minutes, Season 1)
Summary: Let's just say the working title for this was "Iratus Bug Incident, the Second."
Huge thanks to
everybetty for the beta. I wrote this really fast and have been pretty nervous about it, so thank you to all those who offered encouragement along the way. The story is complete but still needs a bit more editing - I'll post as I get each section finalized. Hope you enjoy it!Chapter 1
The world was enshrouded in mystery. Well, fog, but John Sheppard liked to think it made this world more of an enigma, and a routine exploratory mission much more exciting. The gate had been situated in a narrow valley, high up in jagged, rocky mountains. A path cut through the mountains, and John had led the way, wondering who could possibly live in such terrain.
The mountains, what he could see of them anyway, were the epitome of rugged. There was hardly any vegetation, just sheer cliffs of stone jutting up and disappearing into gray overcast skies. The path weaved around rock walls and steep crevasses and it was impossible to tell if anyone had used it recently. The clouds seemed to be descending with them, swirling around the path and filling rocky gorges.
It could have been desolate. Some people might think so anyway, but it was exactly how John imagined the high mountains in Pakistan looked like at their peaks. For all he knew, maybe he was descending from this world’s version of K2—that would be something to write about.
John rounded a corner and came to sudden halt. He could hear his teammates’ feet scraping behind him on the path, and then they too stopped.
“What is it?” McKay whispered. They’d been quiet since the moment they stepped foot on the planet. Something about the fog and the low visibility, the gray light seeping through the cloud cover—it subdued everything, even sounds.
“Tree,” John replied. He stared at the gnarled branches of the small tree, wondering how the hell it had found a way to survive and grow in the rocky terrain. It looked dead now—not a single leaf on it—but it had been alive once, and lived long enough to grow its five or six feet.
“Dead tree. Why are we here again? There’s nothing here,” McKay said, giving the tree a disgruntled look.
“We’re explorers, McKay. We’re exploring. It’s what we do.”
John saw McKay roll his eyes and heard Ronon grunt behind him. He wondered what the tall man was thinking. They’d done some training on Atlantis together, but technically, this was their first real mission through the stargate. Ronon had military experience, was in excellent physical shape, and could blow the hell out of anything with that gun of his. John didn’t know him well enough to read him yet, but he had to admit, the man had style. Just what his team needed.
They kept walking. The air was deathly still and carried a damp chill. It smelled like it was going to rain, but that could be related to the fact that they were walking through a cloud.
“Reminds me of K2,” John suddenly said.
“K2? Really? You’ve climbed K2?” McKay asked.
“What’s K2?”
John threw a glance back at Ronon. “It’s a mountain on Earth.”
“A really big mountain. The second highest on the entire planet actually,” McKay chimed in.
“People call it the Savage Mountain because it’s so hard to ascend. In fact, I read somewhere that one out of every four people who reach the summit dies.”
“What is at the summit, that so many would risk their lives?” Teyla asked, her voice floating in the still air.
“There’s nothing at the summit—just the summit itself. They climb it for the challenge, just to say they’ve done it. It’s one of the hardest things you can do on Earth.”
“And you climbed this K2?” Ronon asked.
John thought he detected a hint of admiration or respect in the man’s voice, and he cringed a little at his answer. “Well, no, not exactly. Thought about trying it, though, if the Air Force would let me.”
“Sounds horrible to me,” McKay muttered. “Altitude sickness, hypoxia, nausea, rock slides, avalanches, death—not to mention the physical exertion of dragging your body up a rock just to see…more rocks.”
“It’s an accomplishment, something only a handful of people have ever done.”
“And you would like to do this someday?” Teyla asked.
John shrugged. “Yeah, maybe. Actually, when I was young, I wanted to climb Mount Kilimanjaro in Africa more than anything.”
“Is that one big?” Ronon asked.
“Highest peak in Africa,” John answered.
“That’s a continent on Earth,” McKay filled in before anyone could ask. The path had widened out a little, and John spotted a few clumps of grass. They were descending gradually but steadily and he tried to gauge how far they’d come. Coming down was easy, but they’d have to hike back up when they were ready to go home.
“When I was in high school, I read The Snows of Kilimanjaro, by Hemingway,” John said, sidestepping a loose stone in the middle of the path. “I became obsessed with Africa, and everything I could find about Kilimanjaro… ‘wide as all the world, great, high, and unbelievably white in the sun.’”
The quoted words drifted off into the fog and John remembered the days spent in his local library, reading everything he could find about the distant, exotic mountain. He’d written up lists and lists of supplies and expenses and exercise routines, like he could have actually talked his father into letting him make such a trip.
“The snows of Kilimanjaro/ should I come home to the sea/ may I follow the jaguar/ climbing alone snow and high mountain/ and rest there.”
John turned around in surprise at McKay, who was staring off into the foggy wall off the path, lost in his own thoughts. “What’s that from?” he asked, hearing McKay’s words echoing again in his mind and remembering what he’d felt when he’d first read about the mountain and dreamed of ascending its peak.
“Uh, poem or something,” McKay answered. “Can’t remember where I heard it…by Maria-something.”
Ronon was watching McKay, his dark eyes sharp and bright, and John was once again struck by how little he knew the man. What was he thinking? Was he impressed by them, or did he think their ideas of high accomplishment were ridiculous, given what he’d already been through?
More clumps of grass appeared, then small trees, the leaves clinging to the small branches in desperation. The path descended steeply through a narrow ravine, and the team spread out behind John as they all carefully picked their way down. They’d been walking for over an hour now but had yet to see any signs of human existence on this world.
The bottom of the narrow ravine opened up into a wide, flat valley. At least John assumed it was a valley. The clouds were too thick to see very far. Through the fog, John could make out clusters of trees. His skin was covered in a light coat of moisture from the clouds, and he rubbed his hands together to work some warmth back into his fingertips.
A snap off to his right had him spinning at the sound, his eyes straining to see through the thick mist. He fingered his P90, not wanting to overreact but also not wanting to be caught unaware. The rest of his team had stopped and were staring into the bank of white haze.
“McKay, anything on the lifesigns detector?” he asked quietly, cringing a little at how loudly his voice seemed to carry all of a sudden.
He could hear the scientist digging through his pockets to pull out the Ancient device, cursing under his breath. John couldn’t quite make out what the man was muttering, but it sounded like it had something to do with why he hadn’t checked it right away and a probable impending death. The valley had grown motionless and quiet again, but it felt different this time, like the place was holding its breath, preparing for whatever was about to come next.
John had just turned away from the sound when he heard a soft grunt from the same direction. He glanced back just in time to catch a glimpse of something dark and furry digging at the roots of a slightly less dead-looking tree less than fifteen feet away from them. It was about the size of a dog, but its front legs were long and thin like the arms of a monkey, and its head was huge and flat and decidedly bear-like from behind.
And then the fog shifted again, obscuring his view. It was just an animal though, and not very big at that. John took a deep breath and lowered his gun, signaling the others to do the same. He turned around, taking another step down the path.
This time the growl was much louder and deeper, and coming from somewhere up ahead of him. He froze, feeling his heart thud in his chest as the first inklings of dread pumped through his veins. A patch of white fog floated across the path, and John blinked his eyes against the moisture.
Something dark and large—very large—was moving through the whiteness in front of him. He could almost hear the soft pats of feet pounding into the stone floor. The fog shifted again, and an animal appeared directly in front of him. It looked exactly like the one digging in the tree roots, only a good four or five times larger. It had been running toward the smaller animal, but it shifted its bulky weight with surprising agility and bore down straight toward John when he suddenly became visible.
Mama Bear.
“Ah, crap,” John hissed, scrambling for his weapon, but he knew there was no way he’d get it up in time.
.
.
.
“John?”
“Sheppard? Can you hear me?”
“John, please answer.”
“Colonel?”
John blinked open heavy eyes and stared at the white mist that swirled and twisted as it spoke.
“John?”
“I can climb down there.”
“What are you, nuts? We don’t know how far down it goes?”
The voice wove around the haze, and John twisted his head, trying to make sense of it.
“Sheppard?”
He recognized that voice—McKay.
“McKay?” he called out, his voice sounding much rougher than he expected. He coughed, trying to work some moisture back into his mouth.
“Oh, thank God,” the physicist mumbled from somewhere up above him.
John pushed himself up to a sitting position, feeling bruised muscles pull along his ribcage. His entire body ached, but nothing was screaming too loudly. He vaguely remembered getting head-butted by the charging animal, stumbling backward until suddenly there was no ground beneath his feet.
“You guys okay?” he called up. They didn’t answer immediately, and John felt a wave of panic.
“We are fine,” Teyla finally answered, and John let out the breath he hadn’t realized he was holding. “Are you badly injured?”
John continued to sit, taking a moment to gather himself. “I’m okay,” he answered, and again heard McKay muttering something above him. He realized he must not have fallen that far. Lucky. “What happened to that animal?”
“It ran off the path after it hit you,” Ronon answered. “It’s gone now.”
John nodded, relieved, and rolled to his feet. As he pushed himself up, he grunted at a sharp stab of pain in his ankle.
“Are you okay? What’s wrong? Are you bleeding?” McKay’s panicked voice erupted above him.
John must have grunted more loudly than he thought. He leaned against the wall, letting his ankle hang in the air for a few seconds. It hurt, but not terribly. It couldn’t be more than a sprain.
“Must have twisted my ankle when I fell.”
“Twisted, he says. That’s ‘broken’ in Colonel-speak, by the way.”
“It’s not broken, McKay,” John snapped. He looked up the side of the rocky gorge, guessing he only had to climb about fifteen feet up. The fog was thick down here and the visibility poor, but the wall looked jagged enough to provide hand and foot holds all the way up.
“You need any help, Sheppard?” Ronon asked.
“Nope, I got it. A little mountain climbing should do the trick.” He reached up for the first handholds as he spoke and was happy to see the mist thin out and the worried faces of his team staring down at him. He’d been right on—they weren’t more than fifteen feet above him.
He stuck his foot in a small crease in the wall and stepped up. The entire side of the gorge was covered in small holes and rock outcroppings. Climbing this would be a piece of cake, hardly a fair test of his mountain climbing skills. He paused a moment to see how much weight his ankle could handle and was pleased when it held all of his weight with nothing more than an angry twinge.
He really had been lucky tumbling down this little rocky gorge. Things could have been much, much worse. Ronon stared down at him, almost smiling as John worked his way up the side, but again John couldn’t quite read the man’s expression. Teyla’s face creased in concern every time he reached for a new handhold, and McKay yelled out a litany of curses and helpful suggestions so fast John wondered if the man was going to pass out from lack of oxygen.
He was about halfway up when he heard a twittering, clicking sound just above his head. He looked up in time to see Rodney and Teyla’s eyes both go round with fear, and Ronon suddenly rip his gun out of his holster to point it directly at John’s head. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw something black and shiny twitching in one of the holes in the cliff wall, dark beady eyes glistening back at him. There was a flash of orange, and the distinct shape of the creature that had haunted his nightmares for over a year now.
He would have screamed if he’d had the breath to. Instead he froze, his eyes locked with that of the Iratus bug’s. And then the insect leapt.
TBC...
Chapter 2
Current Location: Bed
Current Mood: 
tired
tired31 comments | Leave a comment