31. Leave No One Behind

Whatever edge John hoped to gain by decapitating the Queen Bitch evaporated under the oppressive wail of grief that the Wraith fighters started up. Ronon and Ford kept firing into the crowd, taking a few down. While it seemed the fight should be over, the Wraith were not dropping dead or anything, and the three of them were vastly outnumbered.

Then John realized he was standing high on the table, completely surrounded by hysterical Wraith…and completely ignored.

Looking down to where the queen had fallen, his stomach churned. They were fighting for the privilege of ripping her apart and eating her. The room buzzed with their insanity, or John’s brain buzzed with it, and he stepped away slowly from the carnage. He saw Ronon standing alone taking pot shots at the writhing mass of Wraith attacking each other trying to get at the Queen’s body, and Ford doing pretty much the same thing a few steps closer to the door. When John caught Ford’s eye, he signaled him to stand down and back away.

Ford did, then bent over and pulled McKay up. They had lost Kavanagh but otherwise their casualties were at a minimum, and John couldn’t even lie to himself that he wasn’t relieved to see McKay walking. Except for the fact that John was surrounded could not get off the table without jumping over the crazy Wraith, and he was pretty sure that would end with him in pieces. Neither his bad hip nor his recently damaged ankle was up to even trying after the stunt he pulled to get on the table. He looked helplessly over at McKay, who saw the problem in an instant, his eyes narrowing as he tried to sort out a solution. He stepped forward unthinkingly but Ford pulled him back.

It was Ronon who cut a swath through the incoherent mass with his killer phaser gun until he reached the table, kicking bodies both dead and alive out of his way. The Wraith swarming on the floor reminded John of an ant colony that had been stepped on. He had run into enough red ants in the South to get chills from the thought, but not time dwell on it as Ronon slung him over his shoulder, turned, and walked out.

They weren’t followed.

---

“They’ve all just gone insane, or something,” Ford said as they cautiously worked their way through the halls. He sounded awestruck, which Mer had to admit was his reaction as well. The Wraith drones they saw were attacking the ship itself, ripping at the fibrous walls silently. The hunters they saw were fighting each other or killing the drones with their own machetes. It was like being locked up in a Wraith mental institution gone off the rails, which was something Mer thought should be funny but totally wasn’t.

Sheppard was limping behind him, the giant guy—Ron, or Rowan, or something—helping him along. When they came to a juncture Ford stopped, and they all pulled up short.

“It’s too bad we can’t take more of them with us.” He motioned a gun at the row of cocoons that lined the walls of the wider hallway.

“Well it’s not like we can just land the ship and—” Mer stopped. He turned to Sheppard, snapping his fingers. “LSD.”

John shook it at him. “I didn’t lose it, McKay, for fuck’s sake.”

“No, no, look, maybe we can just land the ship and let everyone out.”

Sheppard squinted at him, leaning further against the giant guy, which made Mer want to growl. Not that he had right to lay claim, but…he sort of did. By his rules, anyway. Sheppard didn’t notice or didn’t care, he was busy staring at Mer as if he was insane.

Sheppard opened his mouth to say something but the giant spoke up instead. “Can you do that? Can you save all these people?”

“Yes. Maybe. I’m not a fucking pilot, and we’d have to find the ‘bridge’ and I’m scared to think what they would even call such a thing, and we’ve still got thousands of Wraith wandering around here, even if they are batshit insane. Not to mention, completely different technology.”

“I can fly it,” Sheppard snapped, pushing the giant away. “If we can save these people, that’s what we have to do.”

“You are a wreck, you can barely stand,” Mer snapped back at him.

“It was your fucking idea in the first place. And I don’t need to stand to fly. Get me to the goddamn bridge, McKay.”

“Then do it.” The giant spoke up again, apparently continuing his conversation with Mer. He looked angry and hopeful all at the same time.

“Who are you?” Mer asked, but Sheppard waved the LSD at him.

“What are we looking for?”

“Wait, how did you get here in the first place?” Mer turned to Sheppard.

“I was kind of wondering that myself, along with where we’re going,” Ford said, sounding frustrated.

“I flew the gateship here. Look, I’ll give you the AAR later, right now—“

“You! Flew? Oh my god.” Mer pinched his nose.

“It’s a sweet ride.” Sheppard sounded defensive.

“Are we doing this or not?” The giant crossed his arms and looked—successfully—menacing.

“We’re doing this, big guy. Hang on.” Sheppard patted the guy on the arm before turning to Mer. “Look, me and Ronon and Teyla came here in the gateship. We got Stackhouse and few others out of the cocoons and sent them with Teyla back to the ship. Okay? Can we focus on the rescue plan now?”

John was being snotty but Mer sagged with relief to hear Teyla’s name so he decided to be forgiving. Nodding, he told John how to program the LSD to pick up on electrical and radio signals, along with anything else that might point them towards a hub. Technically, Ford was the ranking military officer, but for some reason after the whole showdown in the Queen’s throne room (or whatever it was) he was letting Mer and Sheppard take lead. John’s background as an officer was shining through his pain as he arranged their little team to head back in the direction they just came from in order to find someplace Mer was pretty sure he did not really want to be.

Except even a genius had a conscience sometimes, and he couldn’t leave a Hive ship full of people to die just because that was the easy way out.