He is a worm.

He crawls.

He is a snake, slithering along on his belly.

Sin, cosine, wave, mapped out. Slither and sneak.

"Hissss," he says, but what he means is that reality is a grid and the colors aren't all painted in yet.

Faces surround them, walls painted in gold and yellow and red.

The blood of the sun, they say, but he knows that it is tears.

He's destroyed a solar system. He knows what it is to cry.

He cries.

Or maybe he laughs.

Around him the buildings pulse, the arena, so many faces.

The snake, they say, is a form of intelligence.

Teyla hisses, but cloaked as she is in blue, he thinks she means that he should quiet.

Writhe.

The Arena. Blue, blue, sky, they fight in clouds, tasting like blood and the - liquid they poured down his throat.

The Puma, they say, is the symbol of strength. Dark and lithe and so massive. Flash, one moment it's gone. It draws a knife. It bares its teeth and dark hair like cornfields fall across it's eyes. It has the eyes of a hunter.

The Condor is made for flight. They say that it can lift the world on its wings. He saw it once, in a stone, on an alter where they made him drink the sky. But he's not sure the sky didn't drink him first.

It caws, but when it screams, he can hear the joy of flight.

Slither. God cursed the serpent to make it crawl forever on its belly. And its only crime was having the intelligence to find the cracks in paradise.

Crack, the sky is weeping. The Condor is chained, pinned down, stuck in a duel and the Puma grows strong. Swipe.

You'd expect that Condor's blood to be blue like the blue blue sky, but it is red like the earth, like the mud of these mountains trapped by clouds. Bleeding, grounded. One more swipe and the Puma will have him.

The year of the Puma is one of strength but the year of the Condor is one of freedom. The snake, the priest had said, is very potent. It is the year of possibilities.

Teyla caws. She is part bird, part Puma, all blood of the moon. She looks in water, and on the solstice, in her eyes you can see ghosts. "No!" she cries. "Rodney, no!"

Slither, sleek, movement without motion and he is there, watching the Puma and the Condor as they entangle.

He coils around, traps that ragged beast, feels fur smooth like skin and cool against his fevered scales.

The snake is for intelligence.

The Condor is there before him, intelligent eyes green like the forest, head cocked to one side, inviting.

The blood of the Condor still tastes like sky.

####

He wakes to beeping. Teyla is sitting before him, hair mused, clothes still ripped and dirty.

"What happened?"

"You had a reaction to the Pachai sacred drink."

Ah, that would explain the hallucinations then.

"Sheppard? Ronon?" He remembers the battle at least. He remember them. The arena.

She sighs. "Ronon was restless. He went to the gym."

His stomach sinks. Sheppard? The Condor's blood was so dark.

"The Colonel was hovering. Doctor Beckett ordered him to his quarters."

Oh.

"But . . . the battle. The Arena. The colors. You saw."

"Rodney. The Pachai have not practiced battles in the arena for hundreds of years. They are a peaceful people. Poor and peaceful."

"But all that gold . . ."

Teyla smiles at him ruefully. "I saw only vines covering the oldest structures. You became agitated. I feared you would trip and injure yourself."

"But . . ." He cannot hide his yawn.

Teyla ruffles his hair. "Sleep now. You will feel better in the morning."

####

John's calves are strong, but his frame so slim, birdlike. Rodney runs his fingers down the sleek curve of his back, looking for damage, looking for blood.

"Hey, cut it out. For the last time, Rodney, I'm fine."

He does look fine. Except this expectation in his eyes, a wariness. Battle fatigue, they might call it, if they didn't know better.

John bends down to pull on his boot. There's a long scar that runs along his ankle, jagged like a lightning bolt. Rodney is positive he has never seen it before.

"Hey!" John objects when Rodney takes his ankle in hand.

"Where'd you get this?"

John shrugs. "When I was a kid. Snakebite."

They never told him, but the year of the snake, Rodney knows, is the year that the Wraith are defeated.

FIN