[Nano] Stained Glass Masquerade

[kittydesade]

Two things she noted that she would never have thought of, and wasn't sure she had wanted to know. Three things. Firstly, that Wraith needed to sleep on any sort of similar schedule to humans, although that might have simply been the human part of Michael asserting itself more aggressively after the retrovirus. Secondly, that Wraith could have nightmares at all, although again, that might simply have been his unique state.

Thirdly, that being so near to a telepathic shriek could hurt so very much.

She tried to shake him awake again. There was very little thrashing and flailing, although his mouth was open in a soundless, wordless scream. Inside his mind, at least as much as she got through the waves of terror and grief crashing through her, it was certainly worth screaming over. There was loneliness. There was fear, the known turning against him and becoming threatening and vicious. Betrayal, and heartache, and she was reminded of the entity that had taken the form of Sheppard and wreaked so much havoc on Atlantis.

Which, in turn, reminded her of the solution. Or a solution, a possible solution and perhaps it would at least enable her to get some sleep that night. She focused on the selfish part to avoid thinking about other possible motives and other feelings.

"I wish…" she started, but didn't know how she would finish the sentence.

No need for special equipment here; she closed her eyes and allowed herself to be sucked into his nightmares.

It was easy to see why he was afraid. And it was Michael, the Michael she had first come to know, human and in the t-shirt and fatigues he had mostly worn on Atlantis, looking around with wide and frightened eyes. In the Queen's room, on a hive ship, the Queen approaching him with her hand out as if to feed. She put her hand on his shoulder, dodged easily as he tried to knock her away. The Queen gave her an irritated look but otherwise seemed to be ignoring her. And still heading for Michael.

Teyla interposed herself between the two of them. "Stop."

"T-Teyla?" And then, in her mind: What are you doing here?

The Queen did stop, too. And then started to advance again. Teyla wasn't sure what to say or do, to defeat the Queen, to enable Michael to defeat her himself to wake up. To speak to him; would he even know or be convinced that he was dreaming?

You are dreaming, Michael. This is a nightmare. You need to wake up. The Queen moved forward to sweep her out of the way, but Teyla wasn't so easily pushed aside. She was, however, a little startled by how easily the Queen was knocked back. Michael, you are dreaming! Wake up!

The world around them began to waver. Teyla felt her head resting on the surface of what seemed to be an uncomfortable bed, and yet she still felt her body standing on the floor of the Wraith ship. It was disconcerting, at the very least. And yet.

"Michael." She turned halfway, keeping an eye on the Queen as she put her hands on his shoulders and forced him to look at her. "Michael, you are dreaming. You must wake up."

"Teyla…" He looked so sad. So terrified. "What's happening to me?"

You are dreaming. This is all a dream, a nightmare. "We …"

Pain. The Queen's hand on her back, that familiar roar. She was feeding.

Teyla found herself digging her fingers into Michael's shoulders as her legs gave out from under her and she tried to remind herself that it was only a dream. A very painful, terrifying dream. Michael's dream. Wake up, please.



The pain eased. She opened her eyes.

She was still digging her fingers into Michael's shoulders, but now he had a grip on her and they were sitting just about face to face, with her kneeling next to the makeshift bed and him sitting upright on it at an angle that looked profoundly uncomfortable. It appeared as though he really had been sleeping.

Did Wraith sleep as they did, a certain period of time every twenty four hours or so? Was it a byproduct of his increased humanity as a result of the retrovirus? She wanted to ask, and had the feeling he wouldn't answer.

"Are you all right?" she asked, instead.

He nodded, uncurling his fingers from her shoulders and straightening, pulling away from her touch. "Thank you," he added, after a moment. Almost as an afterthought, or as though remembering to put it into words rather than palpable emotions. His breathing was still a little ragged, she noticed. Teyla wondered what the dream had meant for him, what he had sensed within it. If the key was still there in her memories, if she…

"You had better get back to bed," he interrupted her thoughts, watching her. Her eyes flickered back to his face; somehow she had the impression, although his expression hadn't changed, that he didn't want her thinking about that too much. "You will need your rest."

"If I can sleep," she admitted. "Your dreams were… unsettling. Are you prone to nightmares?" she found herself asking, too curious for her own good of course. "I did not know you could… might have to… sleep."

All right, she decided, backing up and rising to her feet. Too many questions. He looked at her, impassive and quite probably annoyed.

"Get what sleep you can," he told her. "I won't interrupt you again."

Whatever that meant. Teyla nodded, gave him one more concerned glance over her shoulder, and went back to her room. Her second try at sleep was, as promised, more successful.

Breakfast was waiting for her when she woke up, hot and fresh. Or at least as fresh as it was possible to get from an MRE. She wondered, a little, how he had known to prepare it, if he had been monitoring her dreams or at least her state of consciousness, to be able to tell when she was close to waking. Possibly? And if he had, did it bother her? It seemed not.

He wasn't in the makeshift kitchen with her, but he did join her after a few moments, sitting silently down and watching her with that same strange attitude of not-quite-watching. Keeping her company, she decided. Being polite and keeping her company while she ate, although he didn't need to. And that was another question, although given his response the previous night she wasn't sure she wanted to ask it.

"Would you…" No, that wasn't the right question to ask. Or perhaps it was. "Would you like to join me?" she finally asked, gesturing at the mean. Beckett had said that the Wraith could, in fact, eat human food, although it would not provide even minimal nourishment. Was it possible that they did?

Against his previous response, Michael even smiled a little. "There are those of us who do eat, as you do, for pleasure only. I would hardly call those pleasurable, though." And it was both with a bit of a nose-wrinkling kind of tone and an apology, that he didn't have anything better for her.

Teyla smiled back, a little. "I did not give you much warning; I apologize. I would offer to cook something," she added, trying to lighten the atmosphere a little, straightening her back as she sat up. "But I'm afraid it would not be much better than this."

"We all have our particular gifts," he allowed, sounding amused that she was admitting to be a poor cook.

Of course, after that they didn't have much to talk about, and the silence stretched out and became uncomfortable and awkward again. She finished her breakfast as quickly as she could without sacrificing decorum or choking on it, piling the refuse back into the bag and there did, at least, seem to be a carton that he was using for food waste and such. Well, he was a tidy Wraith. And that was an entirely incongruous thought.

"How are the others?" he asked, breaking into her thoughts and distracting her from what she'd meant to say. "Your… friends."

"They are well." It was an automatic response, as confused as she is that he would ask after them. Perhaps because it would be what one expects? Perhaps simply because he wanted to know what had happened to the people who had imprisoned and experimented on him. "John is…"

"John."

There was no reason for him to note that she had called Sheppard by his first name. Really.

"Colonel Sheppard is doing well, Doctor McKay…" Not that he would care about them. "Ronon is adapting well to life on Atlantis." And then she realized that might not have been the best thing to say.

"Good." Although his tone indicated that he wished the exact opposite. He stood, pushing his chair back and heading towards the door. He stopped, then, halfway out, one hand on the frame. "Doctor Beckett?"

Oh. Of course, he wouldn't know. Any more than he had known about her people, or any of it. Teyla stood too, looking at him not quite looking at her over his shoulder. His back and shoulders seemed tense, under the coat.

"Doctor Beckett died while removing an explosive from one of the Marines. Doctor Heightmeyer died… she was under attack from an alien entity that was inflicting nightmare-like hallucinations. It… scared her literally to death." She couldn't see his face, couldn't tell what he thought of the news. "Doctor Weir was lost on the Replicator city. We don't know if she's alive."

The news hung in the air between them for a long time. She wondered if that meant he was taking it well or poorly. She wondered if he cared, and then revised her definition of caring. Of course he cared what happened to the people who had put him in his current position. Whether or not he felt kindly for them, or grieved for their deaths, that was to some extent a separate question.

"Michael?" Waiting for him to say something was becoming almost unbearable. He turned, a little, so that she could see the side of his face, but he still didn't say anything for a moment.

And then he did. "Three of the people responsible for making me into what I am are dead or lost. And yet I… I am still here."

She blinked. She hadn't quite tallied it up like that. "Three of my friends are gone, yes." And then when she said it she regretted it, not wanting to make it a competition between how they viewed who had died. "I am sorry. You did ask…"

"I did." But he turned and walked a little ways down the hall.

Teyla wondered if she should follow, and then decided that even if she shouldn't she did not want to be alone in this compound just yet. That wasn't what she had come here for. Thankfully, at least, he didn't object when she caught up to him in the hall and walked with him, through the hallways and out onto the surface.

"Three of the people I hated most in this world are dead," he said quietly, once they had reached the surface. He was staring out and a little bit up, at the sky. As though it would swoop down and take him away, and perhaps that was what he was expecting or hoping for. "I am sorry that you believe they are your friends, but I…"

"I understand," she interrupted. And she did; they had all in their own way lied to him, been responsible for changing him. But if Heightmeyer had been responsible, then that made her responsible, too. "Do you hate me for it, too?"

He looked at her, distracted from whatever it was he had been thinking. And when he didn't answer she started to wonder, and worry. "I don't know."