Short Fic: To Live Is No Sacrifice
Dec. 7th, 2010 02:21 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
cedar_groveHere's the one everyone disliked so much, knocked out on this one. There was just so much wrong with The Prodigal, it was hard to pick just /one/ scene to change. It would be like a set of dominoes... so I picked one from near the end. May have been the wrong way to go. Maybe should have done one from near the beginning - maybe the one where she woke up in the control room. Anyhoo - have-at-it.
To Live Is No Sacrifice.
Was it selfishness that had kept her hidden for so long? Selfishness or fear, it amounted to the same thing in her heart, which raced in counterpoint to the measured cloister bell of the Atlantis self destruct warning.
The sound pounded through her, making her aching head swim with crumbling indecision. She had already made one mistake. He had given his word, and still she had demanded proof of his sincerity. She felt the burning of a hurt that was not her own tremble through her limbs. If there was one thing he had always done, it was to keep his word to her. She knew that. They both did. Why had she questioned it now?
She looked down to the child in her arms, her beloved son, so precious – longed for and unerringly protected – bounced him gently and tried to show no fear on her face with which to frighten him. What if they were all that stood between the coming violence and the promise of peace? What if she were the only one that could temper the steel of Michael's hate and turn it to another purpose? Would it truly be such a sacrifice to try – to give the chance of life to her son and all the others that had watched over his coming?
So many questions… so much doubt in a future turned to exile if she were to walk this road. She needed more time.
"Michael, can you hear me?"
The words came as a harsh frightened whisper sent across the open com as she started to rise; to creep from her hiding place on swift but silent feet, uttering every prayer she knew that the Ancestors would grant her clemency enough to keep Torren in restful quiet.
"Less than two minutes." She slipped into the shadows as the voice of one of Michael's hybrids reached along the corridor toward her. She kept to the shadows to bring her within sight of the control room. "We need to go. Now."
She saw him then – Michael – leaning on the control panel, his face rigid with an anger that bordered on fury, and yet… she felt a moment of overwhelming grief sweep toward her, almost as if a well aimed arrow.
"Yes… Teyla," Michael said, and closed his eyes, breathing out a sigh. His voice softened with pain. No one else would hear it, but she could not miss it. "I hear you."
He swallowed hard, twice, and creeping closer still she watched as he raised his head and stared sightless into the middle distance, mentally pushing aside the empty anguish. She felt it retreat like a wounded cur into the dark fountain she knew he carried inside – his emotions – and his expression hardened again as he rebuilt the wall around it.
"You disappoint me," he said, and she perceived his pausing as his banishment of the one last shred of regret. There was no more time. She had to act. "So I will leave you to the fate you have chosen, but I am not leaving alone."
Poised on the edge of motion, she froze, her face creasing into a frown as she tried to discern his meaning, but he was closed to her now. Should she turn back? In all conscience, could she?
"You should know," Michael continued, "that I've already collected your son's DNA. Cloning him will require additional time, delaying the implementation of my plans…"
She fought to remain silent as her own anguish charted an inundation through her soul. That confession of fact answered all of her doubts, subdued her fears and smothered her with the knowledge that her mistrust had been unfair, harsh and unnecessary. He would never, willingly, harm her or her son, and the grief she had felt him reject resolved in her understanding to be his anticipation of losing them both.
"But as you well know, I will not be deterred."
She stepped out into the light.
"As you know I will not," she said softly.
Both hybrids moved toward her, reaching, clearly intent on apprehending her, even as Michael spun toward them.
"No," he snapped, his command a gunshot that had them both fall back. All that lay between her and Michael was the still measured knell of Atlantis' fate. Michael tilted his head in query. "Teyla?"
"No conditions, Michael," she told him, understanding calmly and clearly now the way to take up the yoke of her position – after all, to live was no real sacrifice. "We will come."
Was it selfishness that had kept her hidden for so long? Selfishness or fear, it amounted to the same thing in her heart, which raced in counterpoint to the measured cloister bell of the Atlantis self destruct warning.
The sound pounded through her, making her aching head swim with crumbling indecision. She had already made one mistake. He had given his word, and still she had demanded proof of his sincerity. She felt the burning of a hurt that was not her own tremble through her limbs. If there was one thing he had always done, it was to keep his word to her. She knew that. They both did. Why had she questioned it now?
She looked down to the child in her arms, her beloved son, so precious – longed for and unerringly protected – bounced him gently and tried to show no fear on her face with which to frighten him. What if they were all that stood between the coming violence and the promise of peace? What if she were the only one that could temper the steel of Michael's hate and turn it to another purpose? Would it truly be such a sacrifice to try – to give the chance of life to her son and all the others that had watched over his coming?
So many questions… so much doubt in a future turned to exile if she were to walk this road. She needed more time.
"Michael, can you hear me?"
The words came as a harsh frightened whisper sent across the open com as she started to rise; to creep from her hiding place on swift but silent feet, uttering every prayer she knew that the Ancestors would grant her clemency enough to keep Torren in restful quiet.
"Less than two minutes." She slipped into the shadows as the voice of one of Michael's hybrids reached along the corridor toward her. She kept to the shadows to bring her within sight of the control room. "We need to go. Now."
She saw him then – Michael – leaning on the control panel, his face rigid with an anger that bordered on fury, and yet… she felt a moment of overwhelming grief sweep toward her, almost as if a well aimed arrow.
"Yes… Teyla," Michael said, and closed his eyes, breathing out a sigh. His voice softened with pain. No one else would hear it, but she could not miss it. "I hear you."
He swallowed hard, twice, and creeping closer still she watched as he raised his head and stared sightless into the middle distance, mentally pushing aside the empty anguish. She felt it retreat like a wounded cur into the dark fountain she knew he carried inside – his emotions – and his expression hardened again as he rebuilt the wall around it.
"You disappoint me," he said, and she perceived his pausing as his banishment of the one last shred of regret. There was no more time. She had to act. "So I will leave you to the fate you have chosen, but I am not leaving alone."
Poised on the edge of motion, she froze, her face creasing into a frown as she tried to discern his meaning, but he was closed to her now. Should she turn back? In all conscience, could she?
"You should know," Michael continued, "that I've already collected your son's DNA. Cloning him will require additional time, delaying the implementation of my plans…"
She fought to remain silent as her own anguish charted an inundation through her soul. That confession of fact answered all of her doubts, subdued her fears and smothered her with the knowledge that her mistrust had been unfair, harsh and unnecessary. He would never, willingly, harm her or her son, and the grief she had felt him reject resolved in her understanding to be his anticipation of losing them both.
"But as you well know, I will not be deterred."
She stepped out into the light.
"As you know I will not," she said softly.
Both hybrids moved toward her, reaching, clearly intent on apprehending her, even as Michael spun toward them.
"No," he snapped, his command a gunshot that had them both fall back. All that lay between her and Michael was the still measured knell of Atlantis' fate. Michael tilted his head in query. "Teyla?"
"No conditions, Michael," she told him, understanding calmly and clearly now the way to take up the yoke of her position – after all, to live was no real sacrifice. "We will come."
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no subject
Date: 2010-12-08 09:46 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-12-08 04:39 pm (UTC)Anyway, glad you enjoyed it - but as for my version of TP, you aint seen /nothing/ yet. Wait until my VS5 reaches the story called "True Perfidy" you'll see it then.