3.

They found McKay panting heavily in the doorway to one of the elevator rooms. John may have been in the military for years, but he didn't even know half the curses McKay was using. Foreigners.

"What's wrong?" Ford yelled.

John gave an exasperated sigh and yanked the hand McKay had pressed to his shoulder away. He could just see the hilt of some sort of needle that had dug itself into the scientist's shoulder. What John could see of it was a large crystal bulb, which must have contained some sort of injection, now-released, cradled between silver metal prongs.

Ford made to pull McKay to his feet, but he just whimpered and slumped back against the doorframe. John didn't hesitate, he scooped the doctor up and threw him over his shoulder in a fireman's lift. This started a reinvigorated stream of violent cussing, but John ignored it. "Jesus, Rodney, you could stand to use a few pounds. It's high time we put you on a diet."

And I could be in a little better shape, if I'm going to keep taking him on missions with me, John thought as he staggered into the make-shift infirmary. In fact, John had never been very big on the physicality of it all. He hated the gym - sweaty, boring, and too much testosterone, even for him. But, if it got him in a plane for even a second, it was all worth it.

"What happened?" Beckett was first on the scene, already pulling out his scissors to cut McKay's shirt from around the wound. It wasn't bleeding very much, which John took as a good sign. He just hoped that whatever had been in that vial wasn't a poison. Then again, what else would you put in a needle-thingy that comes shooting out of nowhere? Surely not the cure for AIDS.

John's eardrums were definitely regretting both the fact that McKay was conscious and that the rest of John's body had decided it would be a good idea to help out. "Ow ow ow ow. Did I mention ow?!" McKay screeched.

"I know!" Beckett answered distractedly, looking through his equipment for a sample container. John spotted one and handed it to him. Beckett looked shocked that the 'grunt' had anticipated this, but John had spent some time flying a medEvac chopper so he knew the drill.

"Can I at least have something for the pain? I prefer morphine to demerol." McKay whined. Somehow, John was not surprised McKay had developed expensive tastes in pain meds. If his first calling was not physics, McKay probably could have been a professional hypochondriac.

"No, you bloody well may not! Are you crazy, son? We have no idea what that thing injected you with. Do you want to start mixing a mystery cocktail in your bloodstream?"

"If it includes morphine . . ." McKay moaned.

"Doctor, I need you to . . ." Beckett interjected.

"God, it hurts . . . make it stop."

John rolled his eyes, "Shut up and listen! This is your life, we're talking about."

"Right." McKay took in a couple of gasping breaths. "Which is why I'm thinking morphine."

Beckett nodded his thanks and continued, "Now, I need you to think very carefully . . . is the pain just from the needle or are you feeling effects from whatever drug was injected into you?"

McKay gave it a moment's thought. "Just the needle."

"Oh for Christ's sakes." John practically snorted. Like my drill instructor once told me while I was stranded eight miles from base camp with a sprained ankle . . . suck it up, soldier!

Beckett tapped McKay's arm and took the blood sample, "You're poking me more?"

Beckett ignored him and handed the sample off to a nurse to take to the lab. "We’re going to removed the needle now, son. You might want to . . . er . . . prepare yourself."

John was surprised that McKay didn't come back with a dry -if not witty- rejoinder. "McKay? Rodney?" John looked up in shock. "I think he fainted."

"Well, that's a load off," Beckett murmured, already focused on gently extracting the needle.

………………………………

"Well, Doctor, you're pretty damn lucky." Beckett sighed, putting the test results down.

"I had a five-inch needle stuck in my shoulder . . . tell me, again, how is that lucky?" McKay snarled, laying back against the hospital bed.

"Well, you're alive, for a start," Beckett supplied. "If I hadn't decided to test the gene therapy procedure on you, you'd likely be dead."

McKay did his best impression of a fish out of water. "You . . . you mean that substance was meant to kill?"

"As best we can tell, it's a weapon designed for use against the Wraith. It delays the regeneration properties, so they'll be easier to kill. But, it's also a poison, engineered to attack anything that doesn't possess the ATA gene."

"Holy shit! So you mean I . . ."

McKay continued to babble, but John focused his attention on the slender figure that just walked in the infirmary doors. "What did I miss?" Weir looked concerned, but also almost annoyed - yet another mysterious problem to deal with. John didn't blame her. Ever since he landed the job of flying General O'Neill to this mysterious Antarctic base, his life had continued to spiral out of control - and it wasn't looking up anytime soon. Down the rabbit hole . . . the big shimmering stone circle of a rabbit hole.

It wasn't as though John resented any of it, or as though he'd change his decision if he knew what was to come . . . it was more that sometimes it was just overwhelming. One day his biggest concern was whether or some wise-guy in Washington was going to decide he was overqualified to hide-out in Antarctica and the next there were little green men and wormholes and wannabe vampires. Half the time he was convinced that this was all a dream, or that he'd finally snapped - too many tours of isolated duty.

McKay's chatter had finally died down. At least Weir had some effect on the man. But, then again, John had trouble seeing how she could fail to have an effect on anyone. She had a strange power about her, as though her small frame held someone much more powerful - regal, almost. "Do we know what caused this?"

"Well, I've been in that room hundreds of times since we got here . . . pressed the same buttons to go to the same places . . . maybe someone in the command center triggered a security protocol . . . maybe it's just old . . . maybe it's haunted. I'll have to run a serious diagnostic . . . and even then . . . there's so much about Ancient technology we still don't know." McKay sighed.

"Okay, so the transporters are temporarily off-limits."

"I'm not sure that's going to be good enough. Until I can figure out what caused this . . . or at least how to turn it of, who knows what other booby-traps we might inadvertently trigger?"

Weir gave McKay this sideways glance that clearly said, You are not being very helpful. "Do we at least know its purpose?"

Beckett filled her in. "I can be fairly certain it's an automated defense, a poison that attacks Wraith and people whom, back then, would be considered non-Ancients. I recommend gene therapy on anyone who hasn't had it yet."

"Yes . . . it could serve as a sort of inoculation, until we get the problem under control."

"Okay, Carson, get on it. Rodney, as soon as you feel well enough . . . " By this she clearly meant 'now.' " I'm going to make a city-wide announcement not to use the lifts and to be careful of triggering any Ancient technology." With that she nodded and walked out.

McKay made to get up, wincing.

John raised his eyebrow. "So, the pretty box is no longer priority?"

"No." McKay scowled. "Now, if you wouldn't mind, Major."

"My pleasure." John pulled him out of the bed and gave him a little push toward the door. "Go get 'em, Tiger." John turned to Ford, who had been sitting quietly on an adjacent hospital bed. "So, back to work?"

Ford looked from John to Doctor Beckett's retreating back and then blurted out. "Wait, Doctor."

Beckett turned, expectantly. "While we're here, the Major's been having headaches." Thanks for ratting me out, Aidan, 'ole buddy.

Before he knew it, the doctor was beside him, penlight out and flashing it in his eyes. "So, Major, when did these headaches start?"

Well, there was no point in lying anymore. John sent Ford a death glare. "This morning."

"On a scale from one to ten, how intense?"

"They started out at around two, but they've been getting worse."

Beckett put his light down - thank God! "I would like to get a PET scan, a CAT scan and a CBC."

"What?!" John hadn't even had that royal treatment when he was knocked unconscious playing rugby against those idiots from West Point. Only when they brought him back at two in the morning, puking and unable to see out of his right eye, did they check and find out it was a skull fracture.

"It's just a precaution." Beckett caught John's skeptical look. "Look, your body's been through a lot, Major. You could be one of those rare individuals that reacts negatively to gate travel. You could be infected with some sort of virus. You could be having a delayed reaction to the poison that 'cling-on' injected you with. You've used more Ancient technology than anyone else, and we don't even know if your body can handle it for this extended a period of time. And worse than all that . . . it could be something I haven't anticipated and therefore will have trouble fixing."

"And I thought McKay was Mr. Doom and Gloom. It's just a headache." John pouted.

"Better safe than sorry."