Archive of Our Own

The Air Force Academy didn’t work out the way John had hoped it would. Few things in his life ever did. There was a time, back when he’d first been accepted into the program, that he thought things might be looking up. They weren’t. And his predicament had put a whole new spin on the term ‘getting his wings.’

John had pretty much suspected that ‘the incident’ would be the final nail in the coffin of his relationship with his father. But Patrick’s refusal to even look at him hurt anyway. John could tell from the set of the man’s jaw that beneath the studied civility Patrick presented when he was summoned to the Academy, he was beyond livid. John had been down this road often enough before to know. He’d screwed up more times than he could remember. The only difference this time was that he stood to lose the one thing that had mattered to him since his mother and Dave were killed — becoming a pilot. Not that his father would take that into account. There was nothing that would convince the man John hadn’t deliberately trashed the opportunity.

The meeting with two senior officers and a physician droned on for well over an hour in a room that reeked of furniture polish and old leather. It made John’s head ache worse than it already did. He heard papers being passed back and forth, the crinkling set against a background of low murmurs among the men. John attended to very little of the conversation and contributed even less. The medication he’d been given for the occasion left him disinclined to do anything — which, John figured, was the purpose of it. Hell, he could barely even work up the energy to stop his head from lolling to the side and saliva from running out of his mouth. A chemical straitjacket. They’d likely have used a real one on him except it wouldn’t have fit over the wings.

That thought made a bubble of wry amusement swell in John’s chest. He tried to suppress it, but it broke free as a strangled hiccup. The sharp intake of air let the pungent scent of the room wash across his tongue until he could taste the acrid fumes. The spasm ended on a sort of a gag.

The room fell silent and John squirmed as all eyes turn to him. He could have done without feeling more conspicuous than he already did. While everyone else occupied the low, overstuffed furniture, John slouched on a hard, straight-backed utility chair, struggling not to succumb to the pull of the sedatives and slide to the floor. His wings wouldn’t fit into an armchair. Or a cockpit either.

“Sorry,” John mumbled — or tried to. It came out something like ‘Sshh’ry.’ He swiped the back of a shaky hand across his mouth and lowered his head, his face hot with embarrassment. It was a blessing, really, that the medication didn't let him sustain the intensity of the feeling for more than a few seconds before he was cocooned in a blanket of lethargy again.

Around him, the droning resumed.

John’s gaze slid towards the door. His duffel bag had already been packed for him and deposited there, his departure a foregone conclusion. It wasn’t unexpected, but still… A lump formed in his throat, making him feel as if he were choking.

The rhythm of the meeting shifted. Phone calls were being made by the officer behind the desk. John couldn’t seem to home in on the words, but he recognized the ‘delicate situation’ tone of the exchanges. John didn't figure on warranting much consideration himself, so the efforts were probably being made due to who his father was. Money and political clout tended to have that effect.

John stifled a yawn and scrubbed his hands over his face in an effort to just stay awake. The rough day-old stubble on his jaw was itchy and unfamiliar. The staff at the base hospital had no time to allow him his supervised shave this morning. So many things that he’d taken for granted were now a privilege to be earned by someone less than human.

Maybe John zoned out for a few minutes after that because time seemed to skip forward. He heard the words ‘medical discharge.’ Then the scene changed once again and the men were standing, shaking hands with Patrick, and the meeting was over.

John looked at his father, but Patrick turned away, his face still a mask of silent fury. The man jerked his head to the side once in lieu of telling John to get up off his ass and move it. He hadn’t said a single word to his son since he’d arrived — not directly, although John had no doubt that one of the few remarks he’d caught in the meeting, about someone being a disgrace and all, was intended for him.

With muscles that didn’t seem to get the concept of working as a team, John pushed up from the chair and lurched to his feet. He hoped he wouldn’t run into any of his classmates in this state — correction, former classmates. It wasn’t so much the wings as the drunken gait. That and the clothes. He’d been given a thin, oversized scrub shirt to wear. To accommodate the wings, the back had been hacked out with scissors, making the garment little more than a giant bib with sleeves. The glaring prison-orange fabric he’d had to wear for the last week flapped away from his stomach as he stood and John shivered despite the warmth of the day. It hadn’t gone over well with the psychiatrist that John was more perturbed about the escaped-convict look than about the wings. At least he’d won the fight to wear his navy sweatpants instead of the matching scrub bottoms.

He needn’t have worried about being seen though. The hallway outside the office was as empty as it had been earlier when he was escorted from the medical center. While John cringed at the thought of everyone gawking at him, he hated being treated like an outcast. He’d been whisked into isolation as soon as he’d been returned to the Academy. He hadn't expected that things would go smoothly when a cadet, missing for over two weeks, turned up in the middle of the night sporting wings. But he'd been made to feel like a criminal — and a mentally unbalanced one at that. Confined and studied and heavily medicated. John had a couple of hazy, drug-addled recollections of making an attempt to leave. The fragmented images in his mind could easily have been dreams, but the handprint bruises on his arms said otherwise.

John’s feet stuttered down the hall to the lobby. The morning’s cocktail had made him unsure of where his feet were in relation to his body. Funny it didn’t have the same effect on the wings. John could practically sense every single feather. In fact, for the last couple of days, the wings had seemed more an integral part of him than his arms and legs. And since John was far from stupid, he’d clued in and refrained from mentioning that to the psychiatrist.

The foyer door was made of tinted glass, as were the floor-to-ceiling panels that flanked it. John twisted around after exiting the building, trying to catch a reflected glimpse of the wings. Mirrors and other breakables fell into the category of ‘sharps’ and had also been on the long list of item to which he no longer was given access. The steel mirror in the bathroom adjoining his room had been too small and dull for more than a blurred view of the top of his wings. John wanted to see his entire wingspan from the back. He wanted to see how they attached to his shoulders and spine. He wanted—

What he wanted wasn’t up for consideration. Before he knew it, John was being herded along the pavement on the outdoor walkway to the parking lot — also devoid of spectators.

Crossing the lot with his father was like walking through a minefield. John braced for an explosion with every step. But there really was no way to prepare for being cuffed across the back of the head. Dazed, John stumbled forward beside his father’s car, dropping his duffel bag and slamming one knee onto the asphalt.

“What a goddamn waste of a good mind,” Patrick spat. “No one knows how the hell you pulled this stunt off, but as of now, no one gives a shit either because you’re not worth the time of day. I'll never understand why the good Lord saw fit to take your brother instead of you.”

A blaze of anger burned through John’s mental fog. Using the car for support, he dragged himself up, breathing heavily and blinking away sparks of light from his vision. Once he was on his feet, John clenched his fists at his side, not sure yet if that was going to be an act of self-restraint or a prelude to throwing a punch. His thought processes were running with the same slowness and hesitation as his limbs.

John’s mother used to implore him not to fight back when his father was in a dark mood, afraid that would only make the situation worse, and afraid he would turn out to be like his father if he did. His mother. God, what would she think if she could see him now? A wave of sadness and shame washed over John. Between that and the drugs, the fire inside was doused and his hands unfurled to hang lax at his sides once again.

Patrick unlocked the car and opened one of the rear doors. He snatched John's duffel bag from the ground and stuffed it inside. Turning back, he reached out to grip John’s shoulder, his fingers digging in like talons as he shoved him into the back seat of the car with the baggage. Then he slammed the door without waiting for John to pull both wings all the way into the vehicle.

John howled then bit his lip, choking off the sound into a frantic whimper as he scrambled to grasp the handle and release his trapped wing.

Yanking the door open again, Patrick thrust his head in the car. “Don’t play me for a fool. I’m not buying this crap for one minute.”

With trembling arms, John grabbed for his wing and retracted it, folding it in front of him and cradling the injured tip across his abdomen. Then he ducked his head, determined not to let his father see that his eyes were watering with pain.

John’s father drove most of the day, pausing only for a couple of brief bathroom breaks at out-of-the-way rest stops — places where they wouldn’t be seen, John surmised, and Patrick wouldn’t be embarrassed by his mutant son.

Near dinner time, Patrick pulled into the far corner of the lot for a fast food restaurant and directed John to stay in the car. “Can’t even risk the friggin’ drive-through with you looking like that,” he said.

John had no objection. He was just grateful for a moment’s respite from the motion of the car. His head still ached from being hit and from the side effects of the medication. Each passing mile in the car had made him feel queasier than the last. His damaged wingtip throbbed and even the slightest movement made it worse. A jagged bolt of fire had shot up to his shoulder and across his back every time the car hit a bump in the road. John let a moan slip out now that he was alone. God, it hurt.

“D’you have any aspirin?” John ventured to ask when his father returned and thrust a bag of take-out food and a drink into his hands.

“Aspirin?” Patrick gave a mirthless laugh. “All the aspirin in the world isn’t going to fix what’s ailing you.” He dropped into the driver’s seat and took off without giving John anything to ease the pain.

John cursed himself for his moment of weakness, for admitting to needing something. He could have predicted his father would turn it against him. He always did.

Placing the paper bag on the floor, John toed it into a corner, as far away as possible from where he sat. The greasy odor emanating from the dinner was making his stomach flip. But he took the cold pop and alternated holding it against his injured wing and his pounding head until the waxy paper cup was as overheated as he felt now, and the little comfort it had offered was drained. He'd be damned, though, if he was going to ask his father to crank on the air conditioning.

“Did you take your medication?” Patrick barked.

John startled, causing the pain behind his eyes to spike. “No.”

“Why the hell not?”

“The wings are real. I don’t need an antipsychotic,” John said, even though he knew his father wasn’t seeking an explanation. “Doctor Mackenzie’s an ass,” he added under his breath, relieved that his tongue seemed to be more cooperative than it had been this morning. The relief evaporated when he had to swallow against a surge of nausea that left his stomach cramping and bile clawing its way up the back of his throat.

“What about the story you concocted to go with those… those… abominations?” Patrick shook his head. “Sucked through a bridge to an alternate universe! Did you expect anyone would buy that garbage? And a mad scientist conducting experiments with ten-thousand-year-old gadgets? It’s like something out of a comic book for God’s sake. Take the damn pills.”

Feeling too lousy to argue, John leaned to the side and rummaged in his bag for the medication, suppressing a cry of pain when the motion jostled his feathered appendage. He shook out a couple of pills from the first container and tried to dry-swallow the drugs, but they stuck in his esophagus, forcing him to reach for the pop, which had been abandoned in the car’s cup holder, and take a swig of the now-hot, syrupy drink. The liquid washed the pills down, but otherwise did nothing for John. No way was he going to be able to attempt the other two, or was it three, prescriptions. With one wing still braced against his body, he hunched over, trying to breathe through the churning in his gut.

“Did you eat?” Patrick demanded. “The doctor said the medication works better if it’s taken with food.”

John swallowed again. “Not hungry.” It wasn’t as if a couple of little pills and a hamburger were going to do something about the wings anyway.

“You’ll do as you’re told.” Patrick’s voice reverberated inside the car. “You’ve caused enough grief as it is.”

“I’m not feelin’ so good,” John muttered. “Don’t think it’ll stay down.” He might not have even admitted to that weakness either, but goading his father with the threat of throwing up inside the car gave John a small measure of satisfaction.

“For Chrissakes!” Patrick gripped the steering wheel harder and gunned the engine.

A sanitarium. That’s what it said on the discreet little sign affixed to the wrought iron fencing. Gateways Sanitarium and Convalescent Home. It didn’t exactly surprise John. It wasn't far off the reform school his father used to threaten John with. He’d figured out early on in the trip that he wasn’t being taken home, but he hadn’t asked where he was going. He wasn't going to let his father think for a minute that it mattered to him. John was used to having to adapt to living in new places anyway. Grandparents, aunts, boarding schools — they all ran together in his mind. He’d worn out his welcome at every one of them — not intentionally, but no one ever seemed to think his intentions were relevant. He could add the Academy to the list now. Shit.

While being admitted to a sanitarium was no big surprise to John, what did surprise him were the grounds. After a brief exchange at the gatehouse, Patrick swung the car onto a long, tree-canopied driveway which opened out to acres of well-manicured lawn, dotted with flower beds. In the center, sat a pleasant terra cotta brick building that might have been a large home at one time. It was made even larger by a more recent-looking extension, protruding from one side. The most notable feature, though, was the pond. It curved its way around the house, making it appear almost as if the facility sat in the middle of a moat.

Patrick drew into a parking spot near the house and surveyed the sanitarium. “Wouldn’t have been my choice,” he said before John could even form the question in his mind. “You don’t deserve a place as nice as this, but I was told to bring you here.” He shrugged. “It’s no skin off my nose because Uncle Sam’s picking up the tab.”

Climbing out of the car, John gulped in the fresh air as the wind caressed his feathers. If only he could try it — just once even. He might have given flying a shot right there and then if it weren’t for his crushed wingtip. His heart clenched. He’d never be a pilot now, but if he could spread his wings and—

John staggered when his father planted the side of his briefcase against the small of his back and pushed him onward.

“You look foolish enough as it is without standing there gaping. Pick up your feet. I haven’t got all night.” Patrick marched off towards the house clutching the black attaché.

John trailed behind with his duffel bag. Heedless of the discomfort any extra motion would cause, he stretched out his good wing along the way, letting it catch the breeze. Someday…

An orderly, whose name tag identified him as ‘Chuck,’ greeted John and his father at the reception desk. John saw Chuck glance at the wings with interest for a second or two, but the man was curiously unfazed by the arrival of a birdman on the doorstep. Chuck ushered them through a second door into a hallway. John heard the faint snick of the lock on the door behind them. He wasn’t claustrophobic, but the idea of being locked in made a tendril of anxiety snake across his chest and tighten.

“Have a seat.” The orderly gestured to a set of light gray vinyl chairs placed against the wall outside an office. “Our director, Mr. Woolsey, will be with you shortly.”

Patrick sat, his back as rigid as if the cardboard packaging had been left in his shirt, his eyes fixed on the opposite side of the hall.

John fidgeted for a minute or two in his chair before letting his head hang forward. “I’m sorry,” he whispered, not really sure what he was apologizing for, but feeling guilty anyway.

“I don’t want to hear it,” Patrick snapped.

The pen shook in John’s hand as he held it over the triplicate admission form. He steadied his arm against the desktop and hoped the tremor wasn’t noticeable. Damn drugs. John stared at the letters swimming on the page and tried to make sense of what he was signing — as if his actual agreement meant something. Patrick had given him a choice. Either he sign himself in for treatment, or his lack of consent to treatment would be taken as evidence of his inability to make appropriate decisions for himself and he’d be admitted involuntarily. Some choice.

Mr. Woolsey laced his fingers together and placed them on the desk. “Is there a problem?” he inquired.

Out of the corner of his eye John saw his father withdraw a pen from his breast pocket and lean forward. “No. No problem,” John said and scrawled a hasty signature on the line, well aware that making the choice for himself was a pyrrhic victory at best.

Woolsey nodded in approval and added his own signature to the forms. “Well, then…” He set the papers aside and rose from behind his desk.

John and his father followed suit and stood up.

“I can allow you few minutes of privacy to say goodbye if you wish,” Woolsey offered.

Patrick clicked his briefcase shut. “That won’t be necessary.” Then he turned and strode out the office without as much as a backwards glance.

John walked into the hallway and watched his father leave, staring after him until he was long gone. He suspected it would be the last time he’d ever see the man. John thought he should feel something, but all he could conjure up was the residual emptiness of having lost someone many years ago. He was still standing on the same spot ten minutes later when Chuck returned to show him to his new quarters.

John’s accommodation was an airy room with a good view of the grounds, and a bed that John thought looked about five inches too short for him. He tried to focus on what Chuck was saying about the daily routine, meal times, the call button, and various bits of minutiae, but his headache had upped the ante again and his wing still hurt like hell. All he wanted was a drink of water and a chance to sleep. John swayed and sat down abruptly on the bed when his knees buckled.

“Are you alright?” Chuck asked.

John waved him off. “Fine. I’m fine.” He twisted his mouth. “Fine for somebody who’s suddenly sprouted wings, I guess.” It was the truth. John figured feeling crappy wasn’t unexpected under the circumstance.

“The adjustment to these anomalies can be difficult at first,” Chuck said, sounding sympathetic.

John squinted up at Chuck. Anomalies. Woolsey had used the same word in reference to the wings. And, like Chuck, he hadn’t seemed to give a second thought to having a part-man, part-animal patient. “You’ve seen others like this?” John lifted his good wing a fraction.

“You’ll meet the other residents in the morning,” Chuck said, effectively sidestepping the question. He was saved from further explanation when a young, blond woman tapped at the open door.

“Hello. I’m Doctor Jennifer Keller.” The woman smiled. “You can call me Jennifer. May I come in?”

John doubted he had a say in that matter either. He'd spent the last couple of weeks under a microscope. The medical staff had poked at him, drawn samples, and ordered medication. The psychiatrist had fired questions at him. But no one had listened to him. Not really. He seemed to have lost the right to have a say about anything when he acquired the wings.

John must have hesitated for too long because a small wrinkle creased the doctor’s forehead. But she didn’t cross the threshold to his room.

“How are you feeling?” she asked.

“Okay.”

Jennifer tipped her head, looking doubtful about John’s assertion. “I’ll be giving you a complete physical examination in the morning but I’d like to do a quick check now…” The statement sounded more like a question, and still she stood, waiting for his consent.

Careful not to further aggravate his head, John gave a minute nod.

The woman smiled again and crossed the room. She knelt down beside John and reached out to take his wrist — the one splinting the crushed primaries of his wingtip.

John gasped and jerked away, pulling his arm protectively across his wing again.

“Are you hurt?” Jennifer asked, abandoning taking John’s pulse for the moment, and bobbing her head around, trying to get a better look at the wing without moving her new patient.

“Didn’t get my wing out of the way of a car door fast enough.”

Jennifer flinched. “Ouch.”

John licked his dry lips. There was something wrong about having a conversation like this — about his injured wing. It all seemed so surreal. Maybe it was the medication. Maybe his mind was actually as messed up as Mackenzie had implied. John started to laugh. He knew that wasn’t going to go over so well, but once he’d started, it was kind of hard to stop. He wrapped his good wing around himself, liking the way it felt — as if it might help hold him together. The laughter turned into a dry cough which didn’t let up until Chuck brought a glass of water and Jennifer guided John into lying down on the bed. He was asleep before they’d even left his room.

John tried not to gulp the water that had been left by his bedside. He’d woken up with his mouth feeling drier than the worst hangover he’d ever had. But his head felt better marginally better than it had yesterday and his stomach had settled enough that he was hungry. He couldn’t remember what time Chuck had said breakfast was served, but a glance at the bedside clock and at the schedule posted on the wall by the door said he had only about fifteen minutes left to find the dining room and eat breakfast. He’d have to scramble. He didn’t have time to change his pants and, apart from the scrub top, he had no shirts that would fit over his wings anyway. The clothes he’d slept in were going to have to do.

John glanced at the map mounted beside the schedule, then left his room and made his way to the main staircase. Any concern he had about his unkempt appearance being seen by others was overridden by his need to leave his room and go somewhere — even if it was only to a scheduled breakfast at a sanitarium.

The stairs were tricky with the weight of the wings and John had to grip the handrail to keep his balance. Someone had splinted and bandaged his wing while he’d slept, though, so it wasn’t jostled quite as much with each step as it had been on the way up last night.

A nurse greeted John at the bottom of the stairs and offered to escort him to the dining room. He declined because he’d had more than his share of being supervised. Besides, the aroma of fresh brewed coffee and the clink of metal cutlery against plates told John he was heading in the right direction. Cutlery. So he was going to be allowed to have real cutlery again. It was another one of those little things that he could no longer take for granted. The most he’d been allowed in the infirmary was a rubbery sort of safety spoon. He didn’t know if the doctors there had thought that acquiring wings made him a danger to himself or a danger to others.

John was halfway down the corridor when he caught his first glimpse of the dining room. It halted him in his tracks. There didn’t appear to be many patients in the sanitarium — maybe a dozen or so. None of them had wings specifically, but every one of them had undergone some sort of physical transformation. It looked as if the place had been populated with creatures straight from the pages of a mythology book.

Despite John’s suspicion the previous night that there were others at Gateways with ‘anomalies,’ it was still a shock to see the other residents. A shock and a relief. He wasn’t the only one. He wasn’t the only half-human freak. The sense of relief was so strong that his legs wobbled and he had to lean against the wall for support. He didn’t know why, but seeing the others made him feel like less of a screw-up. The relief didn’t last long. It turned into guilt — guilt over feeling better because others had suffered the same fate.

Most of the residents were in poor health, the mutations wrecking havoc with their physiology. A woman with gills had died on John’s second day at Gateways. Among the handful of healthier residents was Carson Beckett. Carson looked normal at first glance — if he was wearing a long-sleeved high-necked shirt. But when he wasn't, thick white fleece could be seen covering his arms and chest. Carson had been a veterinarian, so his presence was a stroke of good fortune for the Gateways residents if not for Carson himself. It was Carson who tended to John’s broken wing.

“You have to hold still for a mite,” Carson said as he unwound John’s bandages.

John tried not to shift position yet again. The night of his admission to Gateways had been the last time he was medicated. With the drugs now mostly cleared from his system, the need to do something or go somewhere was like a constant itch. “I really have to get outside for a while,” John said. “The nurses keep telling me to rest. Well, I’m done with resting.”

“You have to keep the wing immobilized and that means curtailing activity. The bandaging can only do so much. It’ll be all for naught if you reinjure it.”

John let out a huff of frustration. “I just need to move around. I’d be better off moving around outside where there’s more space and less chance I’d bump my wing against something.”

Carson was silent as he started to examine the wing.

“How long before I can at least go outside?” John prompted, feeling the walls closing in on him a little more, just as they’d done every day since he’d arrived.

Carson sighed. “Ach, lad, it’s not my decision to make.”

“Then whose decision is it?” John demanded. “'Cause while I'm at it I'd like to know how long I have to stay here and what I have to do to get out of this place.” John sucked in a sharp breath as Carson manipulated the good wing, gently extending and releasing it.

Carson paused and peered at John. “Did that hurt?”

John shook his head. “It’s fine.”

“Aye, I can see how ‘fine’ you are by the way you’ve turned whiter than my dear mum’s linen tablecloths,” Carson countered, but his voice was gentle.

“Just get on with it,” John snapped, irritability getting the better of him.

Carson regarded John with a look of compassion.

John didn’t know what to do with that and had to turn away. “Sorry. I… I need to get out.” He drummed his fingers on the table. “Doesn’t look like they’re big on security here. I think I could probably just—” John clamped his mouth shut and stole a glance at Carson.

“Don’t even think about trying to make a run for it. The security is tougher than it looks. Bloody expensive high tech overkill of a system if you ask me.” Carson bent his head to better examine John’s wing. “None of the residents have any inclination to leave. It’s as nice a sanitarium as they come and most of us have no place else to go. Not now. Not since…” He stuck out his arm for a second, revealing the fleece.

No place to go. The phrase made something twist inside John's chest. He'd tried not to ponder the future, because he really couldn't picture a future for himself anymore. Where the hell was he going to go? He pressed the heels of his hands against his eyes for a minute and then forced his attention back to more immediate questions. “Okay, so the residents don't have many options. But why would it matter if any of them left?”

“You tell me honestly how you’re feeling and I’ll tell you what I know.”

“That- that’s like blackmail,” John spluttered.

“I suppose it is.” Carson looked unrepentant.

John scowled. “Fine,” he said. “My wing is healing. It’s my shoulders and back that hurt.”

“On a scale of one to ten?” Carson pressed.

“How did you manage when your patients were animals and didn’t say a damn thing?” John asked, feeling another swell of agitation at being cooped up wash over him.

“I’ll have none of your lip,” Carson reprimanded. “At least my previous patients didn’t give me any of that. Now, on a scale of one to ten?”

“Four.”

Carson arched his eyebrows.

“…and a half.”

Carson pursed his lips with displeasure.

“A five. It’s a five, alright?”

Carson studied John for a moment. “So… a seven then,” he said

“Seven.” John grumbled.

“Take your shirt off and let’s have a look.”

“Carson…”

“And my previous patients didn’t argue with me either. Off with the shirt.”

John unbuttoned the new garment that had been specially made at Gateways to accommodate his wings — a real shirt this time. But the movement required to take it off had him biting his lip against the pain.

“Here, let me help with that.” Carson reached out to ease the shirt off John’s shoulders.

John tensed and opened his mouth to protest, but thought the better of it. His cover was going to be blown anyway when it took ten minutes to remove the thing. He relaxed his shoulders and forced himself to let his arms hang loose.

Carson unsnapped the back panels from around John’s wings and slid the sleeves down his arms. Seeming satisfied that his patient was cooperating, Carson began filling in some of the blanks. “The people who oversee the running of this facility, the IOA, they’re not the charitable hospice organization they pretend to be. They work for the government – or, more rightly, governments. They have ties to several countries. They’re keeping us here to cover up the attacks. They don’t want word of the abductions to get out, because they haven’t got a clue what to do about them. They want to avoid mass panic. Can you imagine the chaos out there if word about what happened to us gets out?”

John grunted when pain shot across his shoulder blades as Carson palpated the muscles. “So you think someone actually believes our alternate universe story?” John asked. It was one thing to be able to compare alternate universe abduction experiences with other residents over the lunchtime soup and sandwich; it was quite another to know that someone else out there actually accepted the story.

“You haven’t been given any more of the anti-psychotic medication since you got here, have you?”

“No.”

“I didn’t think so. None of us have. That's about as close as you get around here to acknowledgment of the truth.” Carson took hold of one of John’s arms and inched it upward.

“Shit!” John yelped when the movement sent a white-hot spear lancing down his spine.

“Sorry. Sorry,” Carson murmured.

“Just…go on,” John ground out, wanting something to distract himself with.

Carson lowered his voice to a mock conspiratorial whisper. “There’s a wee rumor in here about the long coats and jackets President Kinsey favors. Some say they conceal the tail of a donkey.”

John almost smiled — almost.

“In any case,” Carson continued, “keeping us content here is easier and is costing the governments much less than what’d happen if this bit of news leaked out.”

“Well, I’m not content with shuffling around indoors with nothing to do except watch television, and assemble the same jigsaw puzzles over and over.” John hated the way that came out, making him sound like a petulant child. But even if he didn't have mental health issues before he arrived at Gateways, he was going to go stir crazy if he stayed much longer.

“If there are any other materials you want, you should just ask. They’re quite accommodating here.”

“What I want is to go outside.”

Carson frowned as he helped John put the shirt back on.

“Carson…?”

“Your particular anomaly poses the greatest risk for attracting unwanted attention, son. The rest of us stroll around the garden. But in time, I daresay you’ll fly if you can.”

“I can’t stay in here for the rest of my life!” John’s heart sped up as desperation set in.

John made two bids for freedom. But Carson had been right about the security being tougher than it looked. John didn’t even make it out of the building on the first attempt. Some guy named Bates appeared out of nowhere with a couple of goons. With one shoulder bandaged to help stabilize his wing, John wasn’t in a position to argue with them. The second time around, John made it as far as the fencing before finding out the hard way that the rustic brick and wrought iron architecture packed one hell of a punch. What kind of technology the IOA were using, John didn’t know. All he knew was that after being zapped, he’d woken up in the infirmary with a raging headache, and pins and needles coursing from head to toe.

Okay, then. He’d have to bide his time until his wing healed. If he got out of the building once, he could do it again. Maybe he could fly. Maybe he’d be able to fly over the fence…

He tried not to think about the fact that he had nowhere to go.

Waiting wasn’t one of John’s better skills. With the adrenaline rush of desperation now siphoned off, his waking hours were an endless stream of restlessness, boredom and unrelenting pain in his upper back. He prowled the recreation room, the library and the front parlor, looking for something to do. Anything. Finally, at the back of a cupboard full of games and puzzles, he spied a few model kits gathering dust. He took a pass on the box with the picture of a Buick that looked just like the one his father drove, and he nixed the ten piece snap-together replica of the Empire State Building. But behind that, he hit pay dirt. John found a decent Pave Hawk kit.

The assembly was slow going. The wings pulled on John’s back, tore at the muscles across his shoulders and upper arms, and bowed his spine. Some days it hurt just to sit in a chair let alone sustain movement in his arms and hands for extended periods of time. John needed neither a physician nor a veterinarian to explain why. It wasn’t the presence of the wings themselves — it was the lack of use. The wings were a part of him, fused into his muscles, his bones, and his nervous system. He needed exercise to strengthen his body. He needed to fly.

After John’s third and unsuccessful attempt to fix the Pave Hawk’s tail rotor in place, he smashed the model. Then he wrapped the shattered remnants in a hand towel from his bathroom and gave them a burial in the trash can.

John grimaced and clasped one hand around the back of his neck. The simple act of stepping off the scale in Jennifer’s office had jolted his spine and caused the muscles in his neck to spasm.

The doctor’s eyebrows knitted in concern as she recorded John’s weight in his chart. “You’ve lost just over another pound. Is the pain medication still bothering your stomach?”

“Kinda.”

“It might help if you try to eat a little more when you take the pills.”

“It might help if the pills didn’t make the meals come back up again,” John shot back. He scuffed over to the examination table, placed his hands on it, and leaned over, trying to take some of the strain off his back. “Sorry. I didn’t mean…”

“It’s alright,” Jennifer soothed.

John was thankful that she didn’t take his mood personally. He’d tried to shake it off, but it stuck with him like a burr, always there, constantly aggravating. He hunched over the table a little more as his arms started to tremble.

“I’m going to give you a different medication for the pain and I’d like to start you on some nutritional supplements.” Jennifer turned and headed towards her locked cabinet.

“Yeah, fine,” John said, not really feeling agreeable, but trying to tamp down on another flare of irritation over…over… John didn’t even know what had irritated him this time.

“Your wing isn’t healing as fast as it was, and I’m concerned about the increasing strain on the muscles and ligaments of your upper back and shoulders,” Jennifer continued as she pulled out a bottle of pills. She paused and took out a second medication. “Maybe a muscle relaxant would—“

“I don’t need a goddamn muscle relaxant!” John shouted. “I…” He pinched the bridge of his nose with one hand and took a few deep breaths before trying to force a more reasonable tone into his voice. “I need to be able to fly.”

Jennifer hung her head. “I know…”

Sitting around wasn’t one of John’s things either. But the strain on his back took its toll. About the only thing he could manage each day was to sit huddled at one end of a large window seat in the parlor, pressing his wings gently against the wall in an attempt to lessen the strain on his back. Hour after hour, he sat with his head resting sideways upon his knees, looking out at the sky, his chest aching with the desire to fly. The longing hurt almost as much as his back. John thought maybe he agreed with his father after all. There was something wrong with him. Most people would be wishing the wings away, not wishing they could fly.

His plan to escape by soaring over the fence wasn't looking so feasible anymore. But as much as John wanted to be free of Gateways, he couldn't seem to find the energy or motivation to come up with another idea. The more the wings atrophied, the more of himself he seemed to lose.

John couldn’t remember anyone ever having gone to bat for him before. But Jennifer convinced Woolsey to request an audience with the IOA regarding the restrictions that had been placed on John.

It was three months before the IOA reached a decision and gave permission for John to be allowed outside for brief periods — to sit on a bench — tethered at the ankles. But by then, John couldn’t have flown if he’d wanted to. He couldn’t even spread his wings.

It was past three in the afternoon and the concrete garden bench was cold and uncomfortable. John shivered. There was no sun, no warmth to alleviate the aching chill in his body today.

“Hey,” Jennifer greeted in a soft voice as she approached. “Mind if I sit down?”

The chains of the tethers rattled as John made room, sliding along the seat without a word. He didn’t speak much anymore. There wasn’t anything to talk about. He still didn’t eat much either and his clothes puddled on his already lean frame. The wings drooped, lifeless over the support harness Carson had fashioned.

John stared at his knees and Jennifer had to dip her head to try and see his face.

“How are you?” she asked.

“Tired.” The word came out quiet and gravelly. He didn’t know why he was so tired. How could he be tired after sleeping in until noon almost every day and then spending the afternoon doing nothing?

“Yeah…” Jennifer occupied herself with staring at the flower beds for a while and then she looked at the chains. “I’m so sorry. I wish—”

“It’s okay. Not your fault,” John said.

“It’s not okay!” Jennifer blurted, raising her voice.

John sighed.

There was a long silence before Jennifer spoke. “I…um… I have to tell you something.” Her voice had an edge to it and John pulled his head up to meet her gaze. The look on her face was as grey and grim as the weather. She bit her lower lip, but not before John had seen it quiver. “The IOA is sending a consulting physician here in a couple of weeks. They wanted Carson or me to do it but…” She shook her head. “They’re… they’re going to clip your flight feathers.”

John felt as if the air had been sucked from his lungs. The world faded around him. He started to slide sideways, but Jennifer caught him.

“Put your head down,” she instructed. “Deep breaths.” Jennifer guided him into leaning over with his head between his knees.

“M-maybe it won’t be so bad,” Jennifer carefully rubbed his back in the space between the wings. “You might not have to have the uh…the tethers. You’ll be able to walk around more.”

“I can’t stay here,” John whispered. Inside him, the answer echoed back. You have nowhere to go.

The news shook John out of his lethargy. No way were they touching his wings. He forced himself to eat his meals and to move his wings as much as he could, building up his strength. But he knew that wasn’t going to be enough. Not in two weeks. He needed another plan.

The newspaper said a circus had set up in the nearest town. It featured a freak show with all kinds of human and animal oddities. “Twenty of the strangest creatures ever seen,” the advertisement said. That’s when John got the idea to join the circus. No one cared how or why the sideshow acts had ended up as they did. No one would ask questions there. John figured getting hired would be easy. Getting away from the sanitarium was going to be a whole different issue.

John paced the floor of his room with the ad for the circus clutched in his hand when a knock at his door had him stashing the clipping under his pillow. John opened the door to find Lorne, standing at attention. No one was really sure what the man’s first name was. He was just Lorne. Lorne didn’t have an anomaly — at least not one that anyone ever saw. The rumor was that he was ex-military and had come from an alternate, alternate universe, but was mistakenly spat out in this one. John could believe the man was ex-military. When Lorne walked around a room, he looked as though he were patrolling a perimeter. Any sudden noise had him fumbling for a non-existent sidearm. And he had a disconcerting tendency to salute John and call him ‘sir.’ When he first saw John, Lorne had paled, looking as though he’d seen a ghost. Lorne refused to say more about it though. Carson said Lorne was afraid he was being tricked into giving away information.

“I’d like to speak with you, privately, sir,” Lorne stated.

“Come on in,” John invited, now used to Lorne’s unshakable habit of treating him as though he were a senior officer.

“This,” Lorne said without preamble, “is a map of Gateways’ grounds and the surrounding area.” He unrolled a piece of paper with a detailed sketch on it and pointed to an area marked in red pencil. “The security system will be deactivated in that area tomorrow. The forest beyond that point is your best bet for escape. The cover is thick, but not impenetrable and the route will eventually take you to the site of the circus. There will be a diversion at fourteen hundred hours when you are in the garden.” He reached into one of his pockets, pulled out a key and handed it to John. “For the tethers,” Lorne explained.

“H-how did you… Why are you doing this?” John stammered, stunned by the unexpected assistance.

“It’s my job,” Lorne replied. “I’ve got your back, sir. In any universe. Good luck.”

It was only a matter of hours before men in suits caught up with John. But by then he’d been hired and the circus owner was more than happy with his new acquisition — no questions asked. If the IOA wanted to avoid attention, then dragging John away in broad daylight wasn’t the way to go. John had counted on that.

He knew they could consider a more subtle ‘recovery’, but that still might have leave an irate sideshow owner and a curious reporter or two on the trail of the circus’ missing birdman. As John hoped, the IOA settled for the ‘hide in plain sight’ strategy. They didn’t like it, but they could live with John being in a circus — as long as he kept his mouth shut about alternate universes and restricted his flying to show times, because even if he did fly, people would pretty much think his circus act was an illusion done with invisible wires. Besides, the IOA also came to the conclusion that no one was going the take the ramblings of the “half bird, half man” freak act seriously.

After that, a man in a suit showed up at the circus every so often. It didn’t seem to matter where the circus went. The IOA knew where to find John. It wasn’t always the same man, but it was always the same agenda. He’d remind John that the penalty for talking or for flying outside the designated show times would be a return to Gateways with no outside privileges. Or perhaps the rest home in the Antarctic…

The circus wasn’t bad — at least not at first. John was the newest featured attraction in the sideshow. The job was temporary while he built up enough strength to fly around the big top. It wasn’t an act of goodwill from the circus owner. John was already attracting crowds of paying customers. “Is this creature a throwback to our avian ancestry?” the display card read. It didn’t matter that humans didn’t have avian ancestry as long as the customers were entertained, amazed and even horrified by the aberration. Sure, John hated being on display, and he loathed when customers tried to reach out and touch him. But he was earning his keep and he enjoyed the various jobs they had him do for the circus outside of show times. John made friends with the other performers, too. Performers — not freaks. He played Scrabble with the legless man, and he tutored the teenaged ape-boy who had an aptitude for mathematics. John got rid of the fat lady’s ex-spouse when the guy turned up drunk and demanded money.

Unfortunately, the men in suits hadn’t been far wrong about the act done with invisible wires. Like many of the larger species of birds, John needed either a really long run to get started or a good headwind. Neither was possible inside the tent. Instead, he was hooked to a cable over the trapeze platform and swung in wide circles until there was enough airflow over his wings. Then he pulled the cord that detached him from the rig and glided in a downward spiral. The first time he broke free, it stole his breath away. There was nothing in the world to compare to the sensation of flying under his own power. The residual ache in the wing that had been broken was inconsequential. He was flying.

The flight only lasted a minute or so because there were no air currents or thermals on which to soar, nothing to keep him aloft.

After that, once a day during the week, and twice a day on Saturdays, for a few minutes, John circled the three-ringed event. It was far more than his weeks and months of despair at Gateways had ever led him to expect, and yet, it wasn’t nearly enough. But it was all John was going to get. He knew now how easily even small pleasures could be snatched away and he vowed to make the best of what he had. For the first time since his mother had died, John was happy — or as close to happy as he was going to get. At the very least, he wasn’t unhappy.

But that was daytime. The nights were tougher. When John lay awake at night, unable to sleep while the caravan bumped over rutted roads on its way to another town, he struggled under the weight of the certainty that what little he had wouldn’t last.

It didn’t. The circus changed ownership a few times. John watched as one performer after another, one friend after another, was replaced by some shiny, new wonder because freak shows were no longer politically correct. John was only allowed to fly when they needed a replacement act. During the rest of the showtimes, they put him on display around in the back in a cage because, politically correct or not, there were always a few people willing to shell out extra money to see some sort of peculiarity — more than enough of them to offset the meager cost of his existence. Two pairs of faded blue jeans was all the clothing he required. The newest owner said the customers preferred when John was shirtless and shoeless. The truth probably was that the greaseball himself liked to leer at John that way. John’s food rations were cut back, too. “Keeping down the overhead costs” turned out to be a euphemism for half-starving the performers. John found a frayed piece of rope and used that in his belt loops to keep his pants on his hips.

John had hoped the circus would head further south when the leaves began to change color. It was damned cold without a shirt on the blustery days of fall. A fever only served to worsen the chills that already ran through his body. He hunched in the corner of his display cage with his wings wrapped around himself for warmth, his head aching from yet another virus that he’d picked up from a coughing customer or sneezing child.

The feeding hatch on his cage clanged open and one of the trainers shoved in a bowl of water and another one of stew. Today’s offering looked pretty much like the same crap they fed the animals. If he’d had the energy to spare, John might’ve told the man what to do with the dinner. Instead, he focused on dragging himself over to the tray. He wasn’t hungry — far from it. But his feathers had started falling out in patches and showed no sign of growing back. He needed what little nutrition he could get to do something about the ragged appearance.

It was probably the poor state of his wings that had been responsible for the bad landing last month. John shuddered, recalling the resounding crack when his ankle had given way. He’d used sticks and torn up rags to set and bind the bone himself. The swelling had eventually gone down, but it still throbbed all the time.

By the time John reached the bowl, he was worn out and he curled up on the prickly straw, sucking air into a chest that was painfully tight and wheezy. It was fifteen minutes before he was able to pull himself up enough to eat and drink, and another half hour before he managed to finish ingesting a modest amount of water and what passed for food.

For a while, the illusion that he was free had kept John tied to the circus. He’d shoved aside thoughts of flying, unbound by yards of the patched and weather-beaten fabric of the tent. Freedom was a rare treasure, not to be squandered on a rash impulse. But it was clear now that the IOA’s presence had kept him just as much a prisoner at the circus as he’d been at Gateways. If only he’d seen that before he’d become too ill to do anything about it. Besides, even if he hadn’t been sick, there was nothing else out there for him. Exhausted, he lay down and fell asleep again.

Since the bedraggled creature he’d become was bringing in less revenue, the circus continued to feed John the same garbage. Some days it was just enough to keep him alive. Other days, the food made his stomach cramp in knots so bad that he puked until his throat was too raw to even whimper.

Today had been one of the bad days and eventually a trainer had thrown a tarpaulin over John’s display cage to keep the customers from seeing the hideous mess of a creature. Curling up in a ball on the floor, John pressed his arms into his aching gut as tightly as his weakened body allowed. Tremors shook his frame while he alternated between panting through the pain and chewing his lip until it bled, wishing he could just pass out. Pass out or die.

That was when a customer pulled aside a corner of the tarp.

“Hey! That’s off limits!”

John recognized the shout as coming from one of the circus’ security men. Or man, actually. One man. Cutbacks had hit everywhere.

“I paid good money,” was the indignant answer. “I intend to see everything there is to see, even though I doubt what you have to offer will come anywhere near the price I’ve paid if the lousy show inside is any indication.”

“Out!” bellowed the guard.

“Look,” said the customer, “as much as it pains me to part with it, here’s twenty dollars. I’m one of those people who never gets paid what they’re worth so I’m not going any higher with my offer and you could probably use the money because it’s not as if you’re a rocket scientist or anything, though these days they hardly pay them any better.”

There was a grunt from the guard followed by the snap of a bill. A few seconds after that, the customer pulled back a corner of the tarp again. John could feel a draft of cold air flow in. He tried to lift his head, tried to beg the customer to leave him alone, but he couldn’t make his body obey his commands anymore. The effort caused his chest to spasm, triggering a round of coughing that crackled in his airways like broken glass. Then the coughing turned to gagging and another agonizing round of dry heaving.

In the background, John could hear the customer exclaiming, “Oh, crap. This is not good. This is so not good.” The man scurried around the cage and pulled back the flap of material covering the bars nearest John. John felt a hand on his back. He’d have pulled away, but he didn’t have the energy for that. The hand was tentative at first, but stronger and surer as its weight and warmth seemed to quell the rebellion in his body.

“I’m not good at this. I’m really not. You know that I’m not. Well, no, you don’t know that, but another version of you does… did. He did. He… ummm. I couldn’t…” There was a long silence. “Oh, God, what did I do to you? I don’t understand how I — or not me — another me — could have done this. I can’t imagine a circumstance under which my mind would have—”

John was seized with another fit of coughing.

“Here.” The man reached through the bars and placed a three-quarter full bottle of water in John’s hands. “You can have this. You can pay me back later. Don’t worry about the germs. I’m probably the most germ-free person in two galaxies. Or seven continents. I should have said continents, although you already know about alternate universes so it doesn’t matter so much what I say. You’re not going to start puking again or anything are you? I wish Teyla was here. She’s better with…” The man snapped his fingers. “That’s it! Look, here’s the plan. I- I have to go somewhere to get help, but it’s really far away — actually a whole universe away. I should have brought them with me in the first place, but this was sort of my own secret little project. You have to promise me you’ll hang on until I get back because I couldn’t stand it if… Can you do that? Can you hang on for a day? Wait a minute. I’ve got something that might help.”

The man shifted around to where John could see him just a little bit better. He pulled a pouch out of the pocket of his pants and opened it. “I’ve got medication here for just about every ailment you can imagine and then some. When you travel as much as I do, you have to be prepared.” He picked out a small assortment of pills and placed them in John’s hand. “Of course they keep the really good stuff in the infirmary. But these should help until I get back. Okay, scratch the one day estimate because you really look like crap. I think I can override a few protocols and make it back here in ten hours. Ten hours and I promise I’ll get you out of here. You can manage to hang on that long, right?”

John might have wondered if the rambling customer was in need of a stay in a sanitarium himself if it hadn’t been for the absolute clarity in his bright blue eyes. So John gave a small nod of assent. He heard a rustle of fabric and then a jacket landed across his back, letting the man’s warmth seep into him.

“Ummm… I don’t know how you can wear this with the wings and all, but…ah…well, here you go. It’s actually yours anyway. His. It was his. He loaned it to me one night and I never gave it back. I should have given it back to him because you never know when it’ll be too late.”

John felt the man finger the grey-green wings for a minute. Apart from the doctors, the customer was the only person he’d ever allowed to touch them.

“It figures that the wings would be the color of a puddlejumper. I guess you were always meant to fly in one way or another.”

The man’s words triggered something inside. John sniffed and shuddered, feeling tears start to flow, and try as he might, he couldn’t stop them.

“Please don’t do that.” The customer’s voice sounded tight and panicked. “I’m not good at handling illness and I’m even less good at- at this. Sheppard never would have… I mean, I know you’re not him, but this isn’t right. Not in any universe.”

John kept his head buried in the crook of his arm.

The customer tried again. “Look, I know more about you than you probably want me to. Actually, I know more about a lot of people than they’d want to have me know — genius and all with computers for one, but I guess that’s beside the point. I’ve seen the database on over a hundred versions of John Sheppard…” The man paused and his voice was softer when he continued. “I knew one of them really, really well — about as well as any of the John Sheppards ever let anyone know them. And I know one thing for certain; Sheppard was a survivor. He’d fight the worst odds imaginable. Even in the end…” His voice broke and it was a minute before he started again. “The thing is, genetically you’re pretty much the same. Whatever shit has happened to you, you still have it in you to fight — be a superhero and all. You just have to believe that you’re the one worth fighting for this time. So…” The man cleared his throat. “I hope that all came out sounding pretty good. If it didn’t, blame Heightmeyer for that last idea about fighting for yourself. I hacked into her old records before I came here. Anyway, I have to go now, but I promise I’m going to fix this somehow. Just…just hold on. Use whatever you’ve got to do it, but hold on. I won’t leave you behind. Not again…”

And then the man was gone. John was left with a thin thread of hope. He didn’t dare trust it and he couldn’t afford not to.

It was hard to believe that breathing could be so much work. Each inhalation tortured John's chest until he was sure his rib cage was being split wide open. His throat was parched and raw and his lips were cracked. He'd drained every drop of the water the man had left for him and he would have given almost anything for another mouthful, except for the fact his stomach was trying to mount a protest over what he’d swallowed already. John had to reassign a portion of the energy needed to breathe and put it toward the goal of keeping his nausea at bay. He needed the medication to stay put long enough for it to have a chance of doing something.

A chance. Swallowing the pills had been taking a chance. They could have been poison for all John knew, the IOA finally deciding that having him alive was too much trouble, and realizing there was no one to give a damn now if he was found dead one morning.

The roiling in his gut was fierce and John tried to curl up tighter, clenching his jaw against the urge to throw up. He was going to let the pills do whatever they were supposed to do — help him or kill him. Both options were better than what he had going for him now. If he didn't make it, his only real regret was that he'd never had a chance to fly. Not really. Not free to soar as high and as fast and as far as he wanted. John had long since locked away his hope of ever doing that. He'd thought he would be better off accepting that it was never going to happen and moving on. But there was nothing else that had come close to filling the vacuum left inside.

“I guess you were always meant to fly in one way or another.” The man's words echoed in John's head. They made him ache inside almost as much as the flu, but in a different way. The longing to fly didn’t make him want to close his eyes and wait for oblivion to claim him. It made him feel like he wanted to stand at the top of a mountain, stretch out his wings as far as they would go and… The next breath hitched in John’s chest as he imagined the sensation of the world dropping away beneath him, the image so vivid it was visceral. It seemed like forever since he’d let himself imagine that.

The customer had been right. John was meant to fly and shoving the idea aside hadn’t made it go away.

Maybe it was the man’s validation that gave John strength. Maybe it was the pills kicking in. Whatever it was, the desire to fly re-ignited and blazed within him again. He couldn’t give up on flying — not without so much as a single shot at it. John didn’t figure he was owed much in life, but flying, well, maybe he owed that to himself. He was going to fly. He was going to fly or die trying because he’d rather die trying than die in defeat.

Certainty fueled an adrenaline rush that had John pushing himself up with trembling arms. He was dizzy, and had to fight to hold steady until the world settled, but he was sitting upright and that was one notch above flat out on the ground. It was a start.

“I’ll get you out of here,” the man had said. “I won’t leave you behind. Not again.” It had been difficult to follow some of the customer's train of thought, but the conviction behind his words had come through loud and clear and John trusted that. The man will be here. He'll come back. John recited the words in his head, over and over like a mantra, silencing doubt and willing himself to hold on. Whoever had come up with the saying 'don't put all your eggs in one basket,' had never been truly desperate.

In the background, John heard music swell. A tinny screamer erupted from the speakers, heralding the start of the second show. The second show. It was Saturday. Shit! The circus was going to move on to another town after the last Saturday show. John sucked in a rasping breath, willing himself not to panic, forcing himself to relax until the renewed throbbing in his skull died down. He couldn't ship out with the circus. He had to be here when the man came back. He had to.

A plan. He needed a plan to get out of the cage and hide until the man came back. It wasn't the first time John had entertained the idea of escaping, but it was the first time he'd thought there might be something or someone out there for him if he did get away. No, not if he got away, when he got away.

John grasped the bars of his cage when a wave of vertigo struck, reminding him just how high the odds were stacked against him. Sick, weak and locked in a cage. A winged man who couldn't fly, who couldn't even run. A man staking his life on what might very well be a fevered hallucination.

The leather jacket had slid off John's back when he’d sat up and he gathered it up now, holding it close, its physical presence proof that the man was real.

“Use whatever you've got.” The man had told John to use whatever he had. But all that he had at this point was the jacket. John held it up in front of him, examining it in the dim light filtering through the tarp. The jacket seemed heavier on one side — as though there were something in the pocket. Maybe the man had forgotten his wallet. John didn’t think he'd have any use for someone else's ID, or for credit cards that weren't his and maybe a few bucks. It wasn’t as if he could use them anywhere — not with the wings. He stuck a hand in the pocket anyway and fished out a rectangular metal box. It was less than an inch thick and glowed with a soft blue light. Definitely not a wallet.

John's fingers fumbled with the clasp, taking a minute or so to open the odd latch. Once it was open, it was clear that what was inside the box was even more unusual than the latch. A couple of things looked like they might be screwdrivers of some sort. A few small bits and pieces seemed as if they might be used for electronic repairs, but the rest of the implements were unlike anything John had ever seen. Two of them lit up and made his fingertips tingle whenever he put his hand near them.

There was no time for John to ponder the purpose of the box or its contents; he just needed to use whatever he could as best as he could. The padlock on the cage was John's first obstacle. None of the items looked as if they’d be of any use for cutting his way out, but a couple of them held some promise as lock picks — not that he actually knew how to pick a lock. Still...

John inched his way across the floor, taking the jacket and toolkit with him. It took way longer than it should have and it left him even more breathless, pressing the heel of his hand against the sharp pain in his sternum. The floor beckoned. It would have been so easy to just lie down again. He needed to lie down. But he needed to fly even more.

John chose a tool from the kit which looked like something he'd seen used to pick locks on one of those television crime shows. The thin, hooked piece of metal caught a couple of times in the lock, and for a moment, John thought picking it might be as easy for the uninitiated as the shows made it look. It wasn't. He didn't know how long he spent fiddling with the lock, but he kept it up until his arms shook with fatigue, until the muscles in his hands spasmed and cramped and made him drop the tool. It landed between two bars at the edge of the cage floor, and then skittered off under the tarpaulin as John dove forward for it. He stuck his hand out to yank the covering up and pressed his face to the bars searching for the tool. A glint of metal quickly gave its position away. It had dropped to the ground and rolled another foot or so — well beyond an arm’s reach. John let loose a string of colorful phrases that he'd picked up from a couple of the transient hired hands. Then he looked at the box and chose another tool.

A glowing implement looked like the next best choice. Once in John’s hand, the tingling sensation it gave him turned into a kind of hum. It was hard to describe because it wasn’t exactly an audible tone. John frowned at it for a moment, uncertain as to what it might do next. When nothing more happened, John went ahead and inserted it in the lock. The tip of the thing only slid partway in and it appeared to have even less of a chance of freeing him than the first tool. Come on. Open the lock.

John startled and almost dropped that gadget too when it moved in his hand. It twisted around, making a faint clicking noise inside the padlock before sliding all the way in. If he didn't know better, John would have sworn the thing had responded to his silent plea, but he didn’t have time to give that any consideration either. Right now, his focus was on escape.

He wiggled the tool back and forth in the lock. John didn’t know what the tool was made of, but the thin filament part looked like it was made of blue crystal, so he was reluctant to use much pressure, fearing the tool would break off in the lock and leave him totally screwed once again. He turned it just a little harder, though, and the lock popped open.

With his heart hammering against his ribs, John reached through the bars and removed the lock from the door. One step closer. He was one step closer to freedom. It was all John could do not to rush out the door and flee. There was more to his plan than that, though. It was a given that the circus owner would have been told to call for the men in suits if John ever took off, so he had to make sure his absence wasn't noticed right away. He needed to buy himself extra time. The music blaring from the speakers had switched from the brassy recordings used for the first few acts to a wheezy accordion rendition of “Over the Waves.” The trapeze act had started. It was going to be at least ten minutes before John could put that part of his plan into action, so he reined in his impulse to make a break for it, and waited.

While he waited, John put the glowing tool away, closed the box and latched it. He tucked the kit into the jacket pocket, figuring he would be giving it back to the customer. The action was a tangible way of reassuring himself of the man’s return. Later, he would try to grab the tool that had fallen to the ground, too. Granted it was small, but he wasn’t going to risk leaving anything around that might look out of place.

By the time ten minutes had passed, John was sagging against the bars and the adrenaline rush was wearing off fast. With a start, he realized his eyelids had drooped shut. He forced them open and straightened up. He couldn’t afford to give in to the crash or he’d never get going again. He had to be ready.

It was more like twenty minutes before the trainer showed up, but the reason for his tardiness made it worth the extra wait. John could smell the alcohol as soon as tarp was ripped off. It had been pay day yesterday — well, pay day for the human contingent at the circus, which no longer included John. The trainer must have squandered his earnings at the nearest liquor store again. It was one more thing working in John’s favor tonight.

The trainer struggled to fold up the covering and ended up wadding it into a ball with the ends dragging on the ground. He tottered over to a nearby bin and stuffed it away before returning to the cage. The bastard had taken to giving the bindings a twist each night as he closed them around John’s broken ankle. John suppressed his instinct to flinch as the man neared the door. He wasn’t giving the guy the satisfaction this time.

“Back to the trailer, birdman,” the guy slurred. “We're movin’ on.”

John knew the routine. He bowed his head and placed his feet by the bars, waiting for the trainer to reach in and clamp on the shackles. He made sure to place his feet directly behind the door this time, luring the trainer into position on the other side.

The trainer extended his arms and then froze mid-grab, staring at the spot where the lock had been. He blinked as though thinking his eyes were deceiving him. As he leaned forward to take a closer look, John flexed his knees and then thrust his legs forward, slamming the soles of his feet against the door. Pain radiated up from his injured ankle on impact with the cage and he didn’t manage to kick it nearly as hard as he would have liked, but it did the trick. The hinged metal swung open, struck the trainer and sent him reeling backwards.

Still holding the leather jacket, John slipped down from the elevated cage floor, putting most of his weight on his good leg as he touched the ground.

The trainer was bent over, cursing and clutching at his face with one hand as blood flowed from between his fingers, but he raised the taming whip and took a blind crack at John. John had been prepared for that and he swung the jacket out to catch and snarl in the whip before another welt was added to the collection on his legs. His upper body had been spared for the most part because the circus owner wanted the damage to be limited to areas hidden by clothing.

A tug of war over the length of rawhide ensued. John yanked the whip, spinning the trainer to the side. While the guy’s bleary eyes were fixed on the battle over his whip, John stretched out his good wing. Despite its poor condition, a single flap of it was enough to have the inebriated man staggering towards the nearby row of trailers. John let go of the jacket, grabbed the trainer by the back of the shirt and used the man’s forward momentum to ram his head against the siding of a mobile storage unit. The man crumpled to the ground and stopped moving.

The trailers swam out of focus, forcing John to bend over and brace himself with his hands on his knees, dragging in air and willing himself not to pass out. He still had work to do and he had to do it before the grounds came alive with customers exiting the show and workers striking camp.

John pushed himself upright again. After checking to make sure he wasn’t being observed, he moved back to the cage, took the lock off the cage floor, put it back on the door, and locked it — just the way the trainer usually left it at night. One way or another, John wasn’t going to be seeing the cage from the inside ever again.

Grinding his teeth against another flare of pain from his ankle, John bent to pick up the lost tool. He took a couple of steps to where he’d dropped the jacket and he knelt to pull it free from the whip. He placed the tool in the pocket with the kit. Cupping one hand, he dug it into the soil, scooping up a handful of dirt — dirt and probably dung from the smell of it. He stashed the clump in the jacket’s other pocket, feeling a little bad about doing it because the jacket obviously meant something to the customer, but he just didn’t have much else to work with.

John twisted around and shuffled forward on his knees until he was beside the trainer. He leaned over and ripped the key ring from the guy’s belt. There were a couple of dozen keys dangling from the loop and they rattled loudly in John’s trembling hand. He couldn’t tell from the markings which one belonged to the closest trailer and he doubted he had the time it would take to try more than a few. Maybe he’d try the light-up gadget again instead.

Before standing, John gathered up the chains the trainer had dropped because he needed them for his ruse. He grabbed the whip, too, knowing he’d have to stow it somewhere.

It took three attempts for John to get to his feet again.

Carrying his small stash of supplies, he limped over to the door of the trailer. He decided to try the door handle before fiddling with the lock just in case the day after pay day had been responsible for yet another lapse in judgment. Luck finally really was on his side, and the unlocked door swung open. John tossed in his armful of items and turned back for the trainer.

The guy hadn’t moved since he’d fallen, but the rise and fall of his chest said he was breathing steadily. The trainer was a couple of inches shorter than John, but he was heavily muscled and he seemed to weigh a hell of a lot more as John strained to drag the inert body into the trailer.

Once the trainer was finally inside, John closed the door and leaned against the wall, his body threatening to drop to the floor.

These days, when he wasn’t on display, John was chained in this trailer. The old metal cot in the corner of the airless space was his bed. The chain had just enough slack to allow him to use the bathroom, although, with his wings, the cramped facilities didn’t have enough space for him to be able to shut the door. John was never going to be a prisoner in this room again. That thought give him the boost he needed to carry out the next part of his plan.

He hauled the trainer onto the cot, secured the chains on him and anchored the other end of the links to the bolt in the floor. There were costumes in some of the storage crates and John bunched up a few items at the man’s back before grabbing the rough grey blanket from the foot of the bed and pulling it up over the trainer until it covered the tops of his ears. He arranged the other end of the blanket to reveal the man’s feet, and then yanked the trainer’s work boots and socks off. They feet were pale and not heavily calloused or dirt-covered like John’s were from having been unclad for so long. John took the handful of soil from the jacket and smeared it over the man’s feet. In the dim light, someone could easily mistake the dark-haired guy for John, tethered in place for the night, the lumps of clothing under the blanket his wings. Hopefully, he’d sleep until morning, sleep until the circus reached a new town, and sleep until the customer had come back for John.

As for the trainer himself, it wouldn’t be long until his absence was noticed. But the circus might not look too far for him or look for very long because it wasn’t out of the ordinary anymore for employees to go permanently AWOL, especially not after getting their cash for the week.

Bracing himself for his next move, John tugged out a handful of feathers from his wings. It didn’t hurt as much as he’d thought it would. They were already falling out anyway. John placed a few on the blanket, adding to the illusion that the winged man was in place for the night.

John stowed the man’s socks under the thing that was supposed to pass for a mattress and shoved his own feet into the work boots. It had been a long time since he’d worn footwear. The boots were a size too large but they’d make his escape that bit easier. He laced up the boot that was on the still-healing ankle and tied it firmly hoping that it would give the foot added support for the escape. He saved a few seconds on the other boot by just jamming the loose ends of the laces inside the boot.

Getting water was the next priority. John figured he was dangerously dehydrated because he hadn’t produced more than a few beads of sweat wrestling the trainer into place. Water would help him last until the man came back. John squeezed himself into the small bathroom, rinsed the dirt from his hands, and then scooped handfuls of tepid water into his mouth. He tried not to gulp the liquid and he forced himself to stop well before he’d swallowed as much as he wanted, thinking any more would only upset his stomach again.

John scattered the remainder of the feathers he’d plucked, making a sparse trail from the door to the cot. He stashed the whip and keys out of sight at the bottom of a crate. There were other workers with keys, so the circus would manage without the ring until someone found it again. The jacket was the one thing John was keeping and he picked it up again, the feel of it reassuring in his hand.

At the door, John stumbled and hung on to the frame for support. It kept him from dropping to his knees as he poked his head out of the door. He spotted a few performers in the distance, heading to and from the big top. They’d be unlikely to see him, but he held off exiting until they had moved out of view.

The music from the speakers signaled to John that he had less than a minute or two to make it away from the circus and get out of sight before there’d be more workers on the scene making preparations to move on.

A wave of dizziness assaulted him again and John staggered sideways as he stepped down from the trailer. Any benefit he’d got from the medication had pretty much been overridden now. The distance between where he stood and the end of the clearing might as well have been miles rather than feet. Clutching the jacket like a life preserver, John hobbled across the field and headed towards the tree line, his thin body hunched and his wings dragging on the ground. His heart thudded painfully against his ribs, and it moved way faster than his legs. What little air went in and out of his chest was a chorus of wheezes and rales. He made it a few more feet before the hacking cough started back up. Another five feet and he gagged on the mucous being expelled from his congested lungs. He spat it out and took another step.

John’s vision narrowed to a single wide-based tree dead ahead. One more step forward and then another, and then and he doubled over, wrapping his arm around his abdomen which had joined in his body’s rebellion and started to cramp again. But he kept his head up and his sight glued to the tree. The next movement was more of a trip forward than a step. The jostling made his stomach say to hell with the water he’d just swallowed, and the liquid splattered on the ground in front of him and over the stolen work boots. John swiped the back of his hand across his mouth and took three more steps. He was fifteen feet short of his destination.

One minute he was standing and the next minute he was down, flat on the ground, tasting dirt and grass on top of the sourness in his mouth. John pushed against the ground, his arm shaking violently as he tried to get up, every muscle straining to the breaking point. But it wasn’t happening. He wasn’t getting to his feet again.

The circus would be looking for the trainer soon. John needed to be out of sight before even a cursory search got started. Head down now, the image of the target tree etched in his mind, John half-crawled, half-dragged himself the remaining distance. The jacket was still fisted in one hand. It made crawling more awkward, but not once did he entertain the thought of letting it go. His other hand scraped over chunks of rock and then crunched down on the remains of a broken bottle. He kept going. One inch at a time, John covered the remaining distance, muttering “He’ll come back,” until he passed out behind the tree, trusting the customer would at least look that far for him, believing for once that he would fly someday.

Whether it was minutes or hours later when John woke up again, he didn’t know. He was lying on his stomach with his head turned to one side, his upper body layered between his wings, spread out flat behind him, and the leather jacket underneath his chest. His heart was beating a tattoo against his ribs and his lungs were taking in about as much air as he’d get sucking through a thin straw. A wicked headache throbbed inside his skull. Confused and scared, John’s mind scrambled to dredge up information. The circus… Flu… An escape… And the customer who promised to come back for him. The latter memory siphoned off a little of his anxiety — at least enough to let him take stock of the situation.

Hours. Hours must have gone by since he’d broken out because the sounds of the circus were gone. They’d had time to pack up and leave. The ground beneath him was rough but firm. Its dampness had seeped into his jeans and leached warmth from his legs. He was outside. He felt like shit. Worse than shit. A sudden gust of the cold night air had him shivering hard enough to make his teeth rattle.

Then, with the wind, came voices. Distant at first, two or maybe three people, calling back and forth in the clearing where the circus had been, gradually fanning apart from one another. Searching. He heard his name being called. They were searching for him.

John wanted to open his eyes, get up, move, and hide further away until he knew for sure if the customer or the IOA had won the race. But all he managed was a twitch of one hand as he strained to hear the rest of the words over the pounding of blood in his ears.

“Crap! They’ve gone. He’s gone. Of all the—”

The high note of panic marked the voice as belonging to the customer. The relief John felt was overwhelming.

“Where’d they go?” a second voice asked, this one deeper than the first.

“Another town. Another city. It’s a travelling circus — emphasis on the ‘travelling’ part. Damn it! I should have thought of that. It’s just that I had to go back to our universe to get the two of you and the power levels have to be increased slowly when using an alternate reality drive or… Shit! Time was what I ran out of when our Sheppard… When he…”

“Rodney—” A woman’s voice. One of the three was a woman.

“Don’t. Don’t tell me again that something’s not my fault again because I’m sick of hearing people say that.”

“I was going to ask how far this circus could have travelled in a few hours and whether or not we might use that estimation to determine their new location.”

“Oh. Well, of course. I can do that. I was just about to suggest that. But we don’t have much time. This Sheppard doesn’t have much time.”

John tensed. He’d made a last ditch leap of faith to trust in the customer, but now he was going to have to extend that to the man’s associates. The man had come back, just as he’d promised, so it took only a second for John to decide to take a chance on them, too. He tried to call out, but his voice was no more that a low moan that wouldn’t be heard more than a few feet away. Fear that the man might move on and look elsewhere drove his heart rate up and despite his lack of motion he was back to struggling to keep up with his body’s demand for oxygen.

“You’re sure he went with the circus, McKay?” The man with the deeper voice and heavier footsteps was coming closer to John’s location.

“I told you he was locked in a cage.”

“That never would’ve stopped Sheppard.”

“This isn’t our Sheppard. He’s... he’s different. And not just because of the wings.”

“But he knew you were comin’ back for him.”

“What difference does that make? Locked up is locked up.”

“When you are held captive,” the woman said, her words taking on a faraway tone, “knowing that others will come for you makes all the difference in the world.”

There was a long pause before the first man spoke again. “He’s here somewhere. Sheppard? Sheppard!” he shouted. “Where the hell are you?”

The trio stopped talking, the quick crunching of dry, frost-hardened grass telegraphing that they were stepping up the pace of their search.

“Over here!” the deep voice boomed. “Something or someone was dragged along here… Or crawled.”

The footsteps of the customer and the woman pounded closer.

“John?” The woman sounded as if she might be nearing the tree line. “John, we are here to help you. We mean you no harm.”

She was close. So close. John didn’t need to be able to open his eyes to know it was still dark or to figure that the flickers of light that filtered through his eyelids were from flashlights. If he could just catch their attention…

“John?” the woman called again. “You do not know us yet, but we come as friends.”

Friends. John had had a few friendship in his life — all of them short-lived. Either they moved on or John was sent to live somewhere else. He’d learned to manage without having friends now, so why the offer of friendship from three strangers should make his heart clench he didn’t know.

Light played across his retinas again and John realized the woman must be looking his way. He took as deep a breath as he could, braced himself, and poured all his concentration into flexing his wings. Caught in the beam of a flashlight, the long wingspan would act as his emergency flare.

The muscles in John’s back were stiff and unresponsive from the cold and weak from lack of use. If he hadn’t been able to move his arms what the hell made him think he’d be able to move the large wings? He ground his teeth together, feeling the tendons in his neck and shoulders pop with the strain of trying to move.

John wasn’t sure if he actually managed to move his wing or not, but he heard the woman gasp and then felt her drop to the ground beside him.

“Rodney! Ronon!” she cried out.

“Oh, my God!” The first man blurted as he drew near the woman. “We're too late. He's dead isn't he? This isn’t happening. I- I can’t do this again. I really can’t.”

John felt small fingers search his neck and press themselves to his pulse point. “He is not dead, Rodney.”

“Oh, thank goodness!”

The woman’s hand moved and rested against his aching forehead.

“He is fevered and he appears to be very ill.”

“Can we move him to the jumper?” a deeper voice rumbled.

The hands continued to examine John. They were strong, but tender — not like the hands that had poked at him like a specimen or grabbed at him like a curiosity. “Yes. But we must be careful with—”

“How do you know it’s okay to move him?” the first man demanded. “What if he got away from the circus by flying, and- and- and he landed in a tree or- or something, but then fell out. He could have broken his neck.”

The woman’s hands ghosted across John’s tattered wings, the contact whisper light. She picked up one of his hands, now scraped and cut from his crawl to freedom and her voice was laced with sadness when she spoke. “I doubt very much that he got away by flying.”

John felt large solid arms slip around him, winding carefully under his wings. Then he was lifted as if he were a child, while someone supported the appendages from trailing in the dirt.

They couldn’t have walked for more than a minute or so before John felt himself being placed down again, turned into the recovery position, allowing his wings to rest outstretched without being crushed. There were soft blankets beneath him and the bedding had a warmth that John had thought he’d never feel again. He’d have given in to the pull of sleep, but behind his closed eyelids, light blazed and he felt his eyes scrunch up against the onslaught.

“Rodney, I do not think we need quite so much illumination.”

“Don’t look at me. I didn’t do anything. I—”

There was a sound like a large metal door clanging shut. Soft whirrs and faint humming followed, and the floor beneath John started to vibrate.

“Crap! The whole thing’s powering up. It must be his ATA gene. Give me a minute here.” Someone typed on a keyboard at a furious rate and then paused. “And you there on the floor, if you’re even half awake, whatever you do, do not think of flying at the moment.” The clicking resumed. “Favored son of the Ancients in any universe, I guess,” the man grumbled.

“I do not think he looks as though he has been favored,” the woman murmured.

As he yielded to exhaustion again, John managed not to entertain thoughts of flying, because all he could think was that the customer really had come back for him.

Time no longer held any meaning for John. It passed in a haze. Day and night was undifferentiated in this place they called a “jumper.” They. Three people. Rodney, Teyla and Ronon. They never left his side. Their names would be imprinted on John’s mind forever.

There were conversations — snippets of exchanges John overheard when he stirred in his sleep. Fragments of their lives floated around him like a dream, but the emotions were too raw to be anything but real.

“He’s going to be okay, right?” Rodney fretted.

“He requires more medical assistance than we can provide,” Teyla replied.

“It’s not as if we can just waltz into a hospital with our feathered friend, you know. The IOA will be looking for him and if you think they’re a problem in our universe then— Ronon, would you put that thing away?”

“I need to do something. I’m gonna go look for the clowns who did this to him.”

“Do you mean the circus or the IOA?” Rodney asked.

“Either. Both.”

“Did you not hear me say we have to avoid attracting attention?”

“They won’t see me comin’.”

“Rodney,” Teyla cut in, “can we not take him back to our universe? I am sure Doctor—“

“No. No, we can’t.”

“You didn’t get permission for us to leave, did you?” Ronon accused.

“Leave, yes. Just like the medical supplies, it was a simple matter of electronic reassignment. Travel from one universe to another? Not so much. Our IOA has a bee in their collective bonnet about alternate reality drives that draw on zero point energy, and exotic particles, and wiping things out of existence.”

“Zelenka was right,” Ronon stated.

Rodney scowled. “I finally managed to break the encryption on the alternate universe database of the Rodney McKay who put this jumper together. He had tapped into files in other universes — government files, military files, medical files, you name it. It appears that there is yet another illustrious Doctor McKay who generated said exotic particles, proving conclusively that that they could breach their containment field and that they had the potential to obliterate at least five-sixths of a solar system. Later investigations revealed the possibility of wiping out an entire universe.”

“Why has that not happened whenever you have used the alternate reality drive?” Teyla asked.

“My brilliant calculations may have circumvented that problem, and…uh… it would appear that our universe has also been… lucky in that regard.” Rodney said the word ‘lucky’ with the same distaste he might have had for swallowing a bug.

“Lucky? You mean we risked blowin’ up a universe to come here?” Ronon asked.

“Well, I’m working on modifications that would allow the alternate reality drive to draw energy from our own subspace instead and I’m hoping to put it to the test on the Hippoforalkus. But…uh…I’m not quite there yet. However, with the new containment safety protocols I’ve developed, I think the risk, and I believe it’s an infinitesimally small risk, is limited to a planet or two at most — possibly their moons along with them. Now, I will admit that I had to override a couple of those protocols to make the trip home to get you and to bring you back here, because John was running out of time. So… the long and short of it is…um…that would technically be a ‘yes’ in answer to your question.”

“You did not mention this before we agreed to come with you,” Teyla stated, sounding not at all pleased.

“Do you have any idea how many John Sheppards have risked their lives to save entire worlds? Can you fathom how many must have died doing just that? If I’d wasted time and stopped to explain the risk before I asked you to come with me, what would your answer have been?”

“I’d still have said yes,” Ronon answered without hesitation. “I’d do anything… for any one of them.”

“As would I,” Teyla sighed. “He is owed that much and more.” She began carding her fingers through John’s hair. “He is younger than our John was,” she mused.

“Isn’t that the kicker?” said Rodney. “Every John Sheppard I find seems to be younger than the one before.”

“Rodney, I thought you had stopped searching the universes for a replacement for John.” Teyla’s voice was slow and patient, as though she were speaking to a child.

“I did. I have.”

“Why are we here then?” Like Teyla, Ronon held no accusation in his voice.

“Why are we here. Good question. Much as I hate to admit it, that is one of the big questions science has not been able to answer.”

Ronon and Teyla remained silent.

Rodney cleared his throat. “Okay, I’ll admit that when we first discovered this jumper I thought we could use it to… to find… to find a replacement for Sheppard. I know now that isn’t going to work. But then there was this database and I- I just… I couldn’t help using it to check up on a few Sheppards. Or maybe a lot of Sheppards. I didn’t count.”

“For what purpose?” Teyla asked, her voice still soft.

“I wanted to make sure they were all okay. I couldn’t do anything about what happened to our Sheppard, so I thought maybe if I could look out for the rest, I wouldn’t feel so bad about having made the biggest goddamn screw-up of my life.”

It was several minutes before anyone spoke again.

“Rodney, I understand what you are trying to do,” Teyla said, “but you yourself have said that there are a near infinite number of universes. You cannot hope to check on all of them.”

“I know that.” Rodney’s voice was small and sounded unconvinced.

Teyla must have thought so, too. “Do you?” she asked.

Rodney sighed. “What I do know is that I found this one and I think this universe broke him. It wasn’t so much the alternate universe and the wings that did it. I think there was stuff before that. And then take away flying, and take away a team and a city that needs him and this… this is what’s left. It’s wrong and I need to fix it.”

“How are you planning on fixing it?” Ronon asked.

“I haven’t worked that out yet,” Rodney admitted, “but I think I have an idea.”

“Oh, God,” John groaned as Rodney eased him back down.

“Let’s not try that again any time soon,” Rodney said. He pulled a bottle of hand sanitizer from his pocket and liberally coated his hands.

Teyla began to change the bag on John’s IV. “Rodney, we—”

“I know. I know. A doctor. I’m on it.” He recapped the sanitizer, and put it away. Then he settled himself on the floor, picked up his laptop and hunched over it again.

Ronon went to work with water and cloths, cleaning up the remains of an attempt to feed John some broth that hadn’t ended so well.

“I’m s-sorry,” John muttered, mortified over needing all that they did for him. The three of them were barely more than strangers, and yet, far more than friends.

“Nothing to be sorry about,” Ronon said, his manner matter-of-fact.

“Speaking of being ‘sorry’…” Rodney kept typing as he talked. “I’m- I’m sorry for what my evil doppelganger did to you.”

John’s brow wrinkled, trying to sort out what Rodney meant.

Rodney glanced at John. “You know — abduction, nefarious experimentation by one of my alternate selves,” he clarified.

“Wasn’t you,” John rasped.

“Well, I know that,” Rodney replied. “An alternate me. But still, whatever part of me that exists that—”

“Woman’s…name.” John was barely able to get the two words to come out above a whisper.

“A woman’s…” Rodney fingers stopped moving over the keyboard as he appeared to contemplate that and then he made a small harrumphing sound. “I’ll have you know that Meredith is a perfectly good man’s name, too.”

John frowned again, trying to pull up buried snatches of memory from his days spent restrained and screaming in pain. His captors. Barely seen figures. When they did show, they were more intent on the readouts from their equipment than the man morphing before their eyes. John never allowed himself to think about it — at least not when he was awake. He couldn’t do much about the nightmares, but over time they had become less frequent. Now, the terror came flooding back to him with a vengeance.

“N-nooo,” someone moaned and John wasn’t sure if it was his own voice or not. He remembered calling out for help more than once and knowing that there would be no one to come for him.

“John.” Teyla placed a hand on his shoulder, grounding him. “You are safe. You are among friends. Think of that no more for now. You must rest.”

Teyla’s touch grounded him. Safe. He was safe. The present snapped back into place and John pulled in a stuttering breath. But he couldn’t rest. Calling up that bit of information was the least he could do for Rodney. Maybe it would help lessen some of the guilt the man seemed to be carrying. The name… John had only heard it once or twice, and he’d been more than a little pre-occupied with feeling as though his back was being ripped open at the time. The name… John remembered thinking at the time that it was an oddly commonplace name considering the circumstance. “J-J-Jeannie,” John stuttered.

“Jeannie?” Rodney questioned, his mouth gaping. “Jeannie?” he repeated.

In the short time John had known Rodney, he’d seen a myriad of emotions play across the man’s expressive face, but now it looked utterly blank. Rodney mouthed the name a few times as though struggling to process the word.

John knew the moment the information finally hit home.

Rodney suddenly sat up straighter with his eyes wide. “It wasn’t me!” he exclaimed. Then he exhaled, his entire body seeming to sag with relief. “Oh, thank God. All this time I… I thought… I thought a version of me had caused this, too.” He waved his hand vaguely in John’s direction. “The database only referred to a Doctor McKay and- and I assumed it must have been me, but it wasn’t. It wasn’t me.” His eyes misted over and he swiped a hand across them. “Allergies are a bitch,” he mumbled, turning away to stare at his screen.

John was glad the information had helped lessen some of the burden Rodney seemed to carry, and he wished he could say even more to help the man, but he’d never been good at that sort of thing and nothing came to mind.

Rodney continued to stare at his screen, his hands motionless for once. Then his head shot up again, a look of horror crossing his features. “Jeannie! No, not Jeannie. It couldn’t have been. I mean, she was always nicer than me, so how could she have…? He shook his head.

Teyla squeezed John’s arm gently. “‘Jeannie’ is Rodney’s sister’s name,” she explained. “However, that is not the Jeannie we know.”

Rodney’s sister. Oh, hell. John didn’t know if revealing that bit of information had made things better or worse for Rodney after all. And the whole alternate universe thing was doing nothing for his unrelenting headache, so he hesitated a minute before sharing the other bit of information he’d recalled. “She… she was working with someone. Strange guy. Pale. M- Michael.”

Teyla spat out a word that John didn’t recognize, but it was clearly not complimentary.

“Oh,” said Rodney. “Oh. Well, now, I don’t know whether to be relieved it wasn’t me or offended that they didn’t see fit to require my genius for their plans.”

Ronon nudged Rodney with his foot. “Speaking of plans…”

“Ow!” Rodney protested. “Keep your feet to yourself. I have a plan now, okay? I just have to tweak it a little.”

“Would you care to enlighten us?” Teyla asked in a way that suggested Rodney didn’t have much choice.

“Soon… Soon…” Rodney muttered, seeming oblivious to Teyla’s tone, fingers clicking over his keyboard with renewed speed.

Sitting up had been a bad idea. John felt weak and shaky, but he didn’t feel like lying down anymore. The aches that had been muted by medication weren’t quite so muted in an upright position.

John figured Ronon didn’t think it was such a good idea either. Ronon had raised an eyebrow. But since John was determined to do it anyway, Ronon had simply helped him up and propped him against one of the jumper benches, taking care to arrange the wings comfortably.

Teyla had been a little more vocal in questioning the wisdom of the plan, but she’d been the one who arranged the blankets to cushion his back.

Rodney had... Well, Rodney had been what John was coming to think of as just Rodney.

“You know for someone who coulda-been-Mensa many universes over, you and all your alternates have no shortage of asinine ideas,” the man had protested.

Still, Rodney had been the one who’d opened the hatch, making John feel less closed in. He’d apparently moved the jumper, too, so John didn’t have to see the circus grounds again.

John’s chest was tight with a wave of emotion. He didn’t know what to say to thank these people for all that they had done for him. “I…” he began and then stopped.

Teyla’s fingers were light on his arm. “There is nothing that needs to be said.”

John nodded and swallowed. He didn’t know how these three people understood him so well. He wasn’t anything like his counterpart. Not if the glimpses he had of the man through the conversations in the jumper were anything to go on.

“Yes! Found it!” Rodney clutched one fist in the air in triumph.

John startled and almost toppled over. Teyla’s hand gripped his arm a little firmer and Ronon inched closer to him.

“What have you found?” asked Teyla.

“I couldn’t think of a place on this Earth, or on any Earth, that we could take Sheppard to. But then I thought about Atlantis and from what I have seen in the database, that’s where Sheppard belongs — in any incarnation.”

Rodney paused and peered at John. Then he shot a look at Ronon and Teyla. “Would the two of you make him lie down again before he passes out — or worse, the little breakfast he managed to get down this morning makes a reappearance.” Rodney scrunched up his face and shuddered.

Ronon slipped one arm around John before Rodney had even finished speaking. “Had enough?” he asked.

“Y-yeah,” John breathed. He’d been feeling more and more lightheaded for the past minute or so. It was only partly due to sitting up.

Teyla arranged the bedding on the floor once again. “Rodney, John is doing better, but he is still unwell. Perhaps all this information is too much at the moment.”

“I- I want t’ hear it.” Yes, John was kind of overwhelmed by the information. But, for the first time in a very long while, there was a hint of a future for him and he was curious and more than a little scared.

“He needs to hear this,” Ronon agreed.

“He always hated being left out of the loop,” Rodney murmured.

Teyla checked John’s pulse and temperature before nodding.

Rodney got up and began pacing as he spoke. “Our Atlantis is out unless we want to be in a shit load of trouble.”

Ronon shrugged. “I say it’s still an option then.”

“It figures you’d say that,” Rodney huffed before continuing. “There’s no record as to what became of Atlantis in this universe. So I’ve ruled that out, too. But, I’ve been looking through all the versions of Atlantis in the database and I think I’ve found one that’s just right.”

Atlantis. They’d mentioned Atlantis before. As in the lost city. It had apparently been found in other universes, in another galaxy. If anyone thought John’s story about sprouting wings was unbelievable…

“It’s an independent colony,” Rodney went on, “and Elizabeth is the governor. The Wraith are almost extinct and there are no replicators. The one thing the expedition lacks is a sufficient number of people with the ATA gene. It seems the Ancients did a little less…uh…seeding in that universe and there’s no John Sheppard. Atlantis is in desperate need of a decent pilot. No gene therapy yet, so my counterpart doesn’t fly the puddle jumpers. I should note that they call them gateships. Good choice. One of the few gene carriers they do have is Carson, so he can fix John up as good as new. Well, maybe not new because there’s still the wings — there doesn’t seem to be a fix for that — but he’ll be healthy. Anyway, it’s perfect. We’ll take John there.”

“Are you certain they will let John live there?” Teyla asked.

“It’s Elizabeth and she’s leading a thriving expedition. Is there any doubt that she’ll say yes?”

Teyla smiled. “I find it hard to imagine that she would not.”

“Well, that settles it then. I’ll get to work plotting a route there. We need a universe with an accessible gate to get us to Pegasus and then we have to…”

“Trip’s gonna be tough.” Ronon stole a worried look at John.

“Under other circumstances, it might be advisable to wait,” Teyla agreed. “However, I think it would be a greater risk not to seek proper medical attention.”

“Is there a back up plan if this doesn’t pan out?” Ronon asked.

“No.” Rodney tilted his chin up daring anyone to say anything about that.

“Perhaps Athos…” Teyla mused.

Rodney looked at Teyla and Ronon. “I…umm… I’m sorry. My alternate self didn’t leave any notes about Athos or Sateda.”

“It is alright,” said Teyla. “I am not sure that I wish to know.”

“Some things weren’t meant to be known,” Ronon added.

Rodney moved over to where John lay on the floor and crouched down. “So, Sheppard,” he said, "how would you like to go somewhere you can fly?”

John wasn’t sure he understood all of Rodney’s plan but he did get the part about flying. He thought that sounded like heaven.

Rodney was pacing again. “How long do you think it should take for them to consider my request?"

“I do not know,” Teyla said. She answered the question as patiently as she had answered it the first time, and the second, and—

“They haven’t said 'no' yet.” Ronon pointed out.

John lifted his head and turned it around to stare out the front window. Pegasus. He was in the Pegasus Galaxy. Another planet in another universe. It was hard to grasp the concept. It didn’t help that the few stopovers they had made all looked pretty much like earth.

Earth. His Earth. He was never going to be able to go back there. He was maybe going to spend his life among strangers, aliens even, in a distant galaxy.

“Are you feeling alright?” Teyla asked.

“Fine,” John answered before he realized he’d started to shake. He wasn’t sure if it was the aftereffects of the journey on his system or the thought of leaving his entire life behind. Maybe it was both.

Teyla fetched her own sleeping bag and spread it over John. Then she raised his feet a little a propped them up on a backpack. She turned and said something to Ronon. John wasn’t sure what it was because she said it quietly, but he thought she mentioned something about ‘shock.’

“Are you sure they received the transmission?” Ronon called out to Rodney who was up front in the pilot’s chair.

“I’m sure,” said Rodney. “For the most part… I assumed their computers worked the same as our because the other McKay was able to tap into their files but maybe—”

“Gate’s powering up.” Ronon stood up, his hand on the odd weapon he wore at his side.

The cabin of the jumper was flooded with an eerie blue glow

“I’m receiving a transmission,” Rodney announced.

The silence that followed seemed endless.

“They’ll take him!” Rodney declared at last. “Elizabeth… Elizabeth said that Sheppard would be welcome.”

Welcome. He was welcome. The message helped ease some of John’s fear of leaving his own world behind.

His hold on consciousness was slipping, but John used the last of his reserves to fight it off. He had to ask Rodney to do one more thing for him…

The sun had just begun to rise over Atlantis. From one of the outlying tower balconies, John could see most of the city, the morning light making it glow almost as if it were on fire. Far below him, the dark water sparkled. He took a deep breath, hardly daring to believe it was real. He'd have pinched himself to make sure it wasn't a dream, but the hum of Atlantis reassured him instead.

He reached into his pocket and pulled out a piece of paper. It was heavily creased from having been folded and unfolded so often, read and reread every day since he’d got it last week. Actually, it had arrived as an e-mail, but John had printed a hard copy.

John folded up the note and pocketed it again.

Behind him, the balcony door slid open.

“You're crazy. You know that, don't you?”

John didn't have to turn around to know it was Rodney — the one from this universe. Keeping his eyes fixed on the view in front of him, John smiled. “So I was once told.” But that time seemed very far away now.

“Oh. I didn't mean... I wasn't referring to... What I meant was—”

“I know what you meant. Good morning to you, too, Rodney,”

“Yes, well...” The scientist stabbed at buttons on a data pad as he bustled over to the railing to stand beside John. “There's a million and one variables to consider such as wind speed, the angular displacement of your wings, the—”

“Rodney, it's not that kind of flight. I don't need to make calculations to fly any more than a bird does.”

“Just because you're excelling at the Ancient’s gateship pilot training module doesn't mean you can let your natural ability go to your head.”

“Doctor Beckett gave me the 'all clear.'” Doctor Beckett. He was very much like the Carson from Gateways except he was a physician, not a veterinarian.

“Doctor Becket gave you a clean bill of health — not that an authorization based on a pseudo-science means much — and he said your ankle and your wing had healed despite your proclivity for overdoing the physiotherapy. He did not give you clearance to take a suicidal leap from the top of a tower.”

“I’ll be okay,” John said.

“’I'll be okay,’” Rodney mimicked. “I wonder how many of your spiky-haired alternate selves said that right before they hit the ground.”

“Rodney, I'm not going to—”

“We could use one of the piers as a runway. That way, when you succumb to the pull of gravity, as all mortals do, you’ll only fall a few feet and I can just throw you a life preserver. You can swim with the wings, right?”

John frowned for a moment and then shrugged. “Don't know. I haven't tried it yet.”

Rodney tossed his hands in the air. “Oh, great. That's just great.”

John pulled his gaze away from the view and turned to Rodney, seeing the extent of the worry that clouded the blue eyes. This Rodney was different in some ways from the one who had rescued him. Life hadn't demanded that he learn to work around his anxiety quite so much. That wasn't necessarily a bad thing, though, because he also wasn't quite so broken by circumstance. What they did have in common was that both of them had offered John their unconditional friendship. It was that, more than anything, which put added conviction in John's words when he repeated them. “I’ll be okay.”

Rodney looked at John for a long minute then his jaw set with grim resolution. “Fine. Let's get started.”

John put one foot on the bottom of the three steps that would take him to a platform jutting out from the far side of the railing. He and Rodney had constructed it because the easiest way for John to get the needed airflow for flight was to just drop off into the air. Rodney had dubbed their retrofit 'the gangplank.'

“The sooner we get this done, the sooner we can eat breakfast,” Rodney added.

John stepped back down. “You didn't eat breakfast?”

“I was too busy rechecking the weather and flight calculations. Even a small shift in wind direction and- and... splat.”

John grimaced at the description. “What about your hypoglycemia? You need to eat.”

“I...um....I had a power bar...or two...or maybe three...and a coffee to stave it off,” he admitted sheepishly. Then his eyes widened. “Aha!”

John crossed his arms. “What does that 'aha' mean?”

“It means,” said Rodney, pointing an accusing finger, “you didn’t eat breakfast because if you did, you’d have been in the mess hall to know that I wasn’t there.”

John scowled at Rodney. “I don’t have hypoglycemia.”

“But you did arrive here underweight and malnourished.”

“I eat plenty now,” John huffed.

“Just not today,” Rodney persisted. He narrowed his eyes. “You’re nervous, too, aren’t you?”

“Who, me?” John gave a lopsided grin and tried to look as confident as he possibly could despite housing every butterfly in two galaxies in the pit of his stomach. “Nah.”

“Liar,” said Rodney.

“I can fly. It’s not like I haven’t flown at all before.”

“Carson made you do a few small test flights. It’s not the same thing. And I’d hardly call a minute or two of fluttering around a tent ‘flying.’”

John’s shoulders drooped and he stared at the floor. “Me neither,” he mumbled.

“Ah, damn. I didn’t mean to… I wasn’t trying to… Look, I should probably tell you right now that I have a tendency to say the wrong thing. And I’m sorry, but if you want to be my friend, you’re just going to have to put up with it.”

Friend. John lifted his head again and smiled. “I think I can handle that.”

Rodney beamed. “Really?”

“Yeah. So, uh…” John gestured towards the gangplank.

“T minus zero,” said Rodney. His right arm flailed around for a few seconds as though he were trying to decide whether a handshake or a high five was in order. He settled on neither and went back to clutching the data pad with both hands. “Good luck.”

John nodded. “Thanks.” But he didn’t need luck anymore. He had friends and a place that wanted him, a place that needed him.

He tilted his head up as he climbed the stairs, catching the warmth of the sun on his face. The sky before him was cloudless. John took a few slow, deep breaths as he spread his wings, feeling muscles and sinews ripple with newly gained strength. A breeze riffled through John’s feathers, beckoning him as the wind picked up.

John took two long strides and leaped.

It was like the sensation of going over the top of a roller coaster, raised to the power of ten. Chaos reigned. John’s wings strained against the force of the air currents. The wind pulled at his eyes, making them tear, and it roared in his ears. He dipped too low on one side and for a moment, he thought he might flip over. His attempt to correct had him pitching downward, racing towards the water, managing to level off just as his toes skimmed the ocean and sent up a stinging spray of salt water. Flight was harsh, and raw, and terrifying, and it was everything John had imagined it would be and more.

He closed his eyes, allowing the sensations to wash over him until flight was all that existed, until he’d cast off the memory of every shackle that had ever held him down, physically and mentally, until he felt free and whole. When John opened his eyes again, he was soaring, soaring with the ease of one born for flight. He swooped in a wide arc, angling himself up towards the top of the tallest spire of Atlantis, towards his future. For the first time in as long as he could remember, he felt no pain.