[nano] Stained Glass Masquerade

[kittydesade]

It was strange. His presence in her mind, alien and yet somehow not so at the same time. It was akin to having a teacher's hands over hers as she practiced at the bantos sticks, or someone looking over her shoulder while she deciphered some text. He guided her, showed her where to go, but did not push her in any one direction and he was an amazingly good teacher.

[I am beginning to see …] But she couldn't think of a way to end that sentence. And if they had been speaking aloud that would have been where it ended, before a completing thought.

In mind to mind contact he saw at least the shape of her intent of the rest of it, and she understood that he saw, and that too was very strange. He saw that she was understanding some of what he must have lost, leaving a world that communicated entirely on a different level than the humans, being lied to by another Wraith community.

[Outright lies are difficult, mind to mind. It is why most hives will communicate with each other through speech, presuming that the hives are not in alliance.]

She knew he was putting concepts into limiting words for her, and she was grateful. And still, Teyla felt herself almost overwhelmed by the ideas behind them, the concepts and thoughts that drove the words and thoughts sliding along each other and…

… she opened her eyes, not realizing she had closed them. It took her a couple of moments to gasp for air.

"Are you all right?"

His hand was on her shoulder, concern evident in his voice. His Wraith voice. Somehow, between their minds, she had forgotten. Had heard only Lieutenant Michael Kenmore, the man she had come to know and care for during his brief stay.

"I believe I will be," she said, forcing a smile to at least reassure him that no harm had been done. "Thank you."

Both for the lesson and for the concern. He nodded, standing and moving across the hall to the kitchen for a glass of water, which he pressed into her hand. She smiled gratefully at him, this time, for real.

"I didn't realize it would be so difficult for you," he said, a backhanded sort of apology and a tacit way of asking if she would like to continue, she thought. "If you would like…"

"Not difficult," she hastened to amend. "Merely… more intense than I was expecting."

There was an expression there that almost might have been a human smile, a tiny flicker of calm and casual amusement. No malice in it, not even wariness or antagonism. And she found it more strange that she did not find it strange at all.

"I'm afraid I won't be a very good teacher. It is not something I ever thought I would have to teach…"

"Because it is as natural to your people as learning how to speak aloud is natural to mine," Teyla nodded.

"Exactly."

The contact made the silence less oppressive. For a little while she simply sat, drank the water, let herself recover. He watched her with that same tiny almost-smile expression, and although she was more than a little curious as to what it meant, she did not ask. Not yet. Perhaps on her next visit.

"You …" she started to say something and then stopped again. He tilted his head at her, quizzical expression more recognizeable now, perhaps because of the telepathic contact. "There is something I … would like to ask you about, I suppose. And yet I am not sure how to ask you without sounding offensive."

The quizzical look became more pronounced. "And having said that…" he shrugged. "Ask what you want to ask."

She smiled a little crookedly, fairly sure that he wouldn't take it well regardless of her warning. But she had brought it up, she might as well ask. "You appear… more human now than you did after the first time we…" What was the right word. She didn't have any sense of how to say it. Facts seemed to be the least damaging, without inviting more tirades or at least anger. "Injected you with the retrovirus."

He did close off somewhat. But rather than angry he only looked tired, no more upset than he had been during their past several meetings. "The retrovirus was a greater success than Beckett first thought. Every injection left me halted further and further from what I was. As I reverted the second time…" He stood, looking away.

"I am sorry," she said quietly, but didn't approach. She wasn't sure what else there was to say.

"I know."

She reached out without quite knowing what she was doing, trying to attune herself to what he was thinking the way he seemed to have attuned himself to her. He flinched, and she drew her hand back where she had extended it to give herself a physical focus as well as the telepathic component.

Michael shook his head. "It's all right. You were being…" she watched him searching for a word. "Loud."

"Loud?" Teyla almost laughed. It didn't sound like a word she would have used, at any rate.

[Loud.]

Ow. At that volume, she winced, and then smiled a little ruefully. And continued to wince. "Ah. I see."

[It is a habit of children.] And by children she had the distinct impression that he means Wraith children. [You will learn more control in time.]

[I hope so. I would hate to cause you such discomfort every time I attempt to speak to you in this way.] That was gently teasing, and seemed to be at a more acceptable volume, because he smiled rather than winced that time.

She had meant, thought, to express that she was sorry, her sorrow and sympathy in a way that might be more acceptable to him, or a way that he was more used to. It was easier when they started off with telepathic communication. She had a sense of proportion, where to pitch her mental voice, how hard to push.

There was a sense of startlement, or she might have only thought that because his eyes widened a little. It was somewhat unnerving as well, to be aware of what he was feeling although he was directly across the room. It seemed somehow more intimate than they should be at three or four feet distant. She took a breath, let it out again, and tried to focus her emotions. She truly did regret what had happened between them, and she was sorry that he was in pain.

None of which meant that she had forgotten what he had done to the Taranan colony, and here there was a spark of acknowledgement. A quiet and simple admission that he was not a very nice person and, no.

No, she disagreed with that. He was not necessarily not a nice person, simply one in an untenable position. He had been victimized by both her people and his, and it would be foolish not to expect him to be upset about it.

Again the startlement. And she tilted her head at him, still not used to this method of communication and a little disturbed by how easily she was falling into it. "You did not believe me?" It felt as though she had to hear her voice aloud to remember how to speak. She was pretty sure Sheppard would not appreciate if she came back to Atlantis mute.

"I was.. not entirely sure I could believe you. Not because you were not sincere," he added, and she realized he'd withdrawn herself so neatly from her mind that she hadn't noticed she was no longer receiving his emotions any longer. "But I was not sure how much you believed, yourself."

Words, she understood now, could be so limiting. And yet she thought she understood what he meant. "I wondered. And that is part of why I come to speak with you, I want to try to understand…"

Michael shook his head again. "I do not know if you can."

"I would still like to try."

His smile was a little more broad that time, a little more real. But sadder. She wondered when it was that she would stop seeing Michael Kenmore, the human lieutenant, and simply see Michael. It was the mouth, more than anything. His mouth was particularly human, and there was absolutely no reason she should be focusing on that right now. Especially not where he could potentially hear her.

Teyla dragged her focus back to him and smiled to cover the moment. She had no idea whether she was successful or not. "May we try again?"