She didn't want to leave. It had been such a short time since Sheppard had flown her back out to him and it already seemed too short a span of days. Which was odd, Michael reminded her with a wry smile, when considering how apprehensive she had been at first.

They had come to know each other so very much more in that short span of days, was her reply. And was that so hard to believe?

Not really. They were alike in the strangest ways, both of them the unwilling subject of experiments that altered their very genetic makeup, stranding them with one foot in a world not their own. Her Wraith DNA, his human, and both of them were freaks even among their own people. Although, to be sure, her people welcomed her more than his ever had. It no longer bothered him to talk about it, covering the well-trod conversational ground with a weary acceptance.

Easier to accept, perhaps, with her there. With her there, he wasn't so alone.

And she could accept that, too, finally. Understand what they had taken from him, the emptiness of being all alone inside his own head. It had hit on her at some point when they had separated, the contrast between the warmth and proximity of his mind to hers, and the cold emptiness of being isolated. It was like stepping from a slightly humid and comfortingly heated enclosure into the middle of, perhaps not a snowstorm, but a barren and chilled rock landscape. Not even the malevolent lie of life that a wind could sometimes give. Nothingness.

"And when I am gone..." she said, in a momentary flash of worry for him, his mental well-being.

He smiled, one hand covering hers. "Then I will have the memory of what passed between us and the hope that you will come back," he told her, and she had the feeling he was saying it more to reassure her than because it was true. "Which is more than I have had in a long time."

Which was possibly true. There was no hope to be had for him now, that any Wraith ship would take him in. She was different.

Teyla smiled a little ruefully. "If my people ..." If she had known what had happened to them she would have invited him back to them. At least to a part, perhaps, a few friends she thought she could trust to be open-minded enough to make friends. But they were no longer on New Athos and she did not know what happened to them, and grief made her words swell in her throat.

In a manner characteristic of what they had become, Michael took her into his arms and held her tightly. It was what everyone on Atlantis had been waiting for since they had learned of the disappearance of the Athosians, and yet she had held herself apart and strong. For some reason, she didn't know why. Perhaps she simply didn't want them to think that she was incapable of handling adversity.

Which, Michael's thought implied, was ridiculous. If they were such people that would look down on her or ridicule her for mourning or raging at the loss of her people, then they were not worthy companions. Not worthy, perhaps, might be an unusual or inaccurate sentiment, and her reply held more than a little dry amusement at the overtones of his thinking.

But, no. That had simply been her mistaken perception, her reflex, to hide away. And in hiding, force herself to be strong, not to break, because once she broke...

She wouldn't be sure she could stop herself. He knew.

It was the knowing that undid her. Not simply someone, Ronon, telling her he understood. Being able to know that Michael felt as keenly as she did the loss, the unknowing whether or not friends and family were dead or alive, being able to feel it as he did and having him bear it away like a person with a jar of leeches that had drained the poison off, she went to pieces.

Before she quite knew what she was doing she was sobbing into his shoulder, fingers curled tight in his coat. And he eased her to the bench and sat down and drew her close against him, holding her.

"Teyla."

She wasn't sure if he was trying to get her attention or simply giving her a point upon which to anchor herself, rather than losing her in their combined loneliness and her newly-aggravated pain. She swallowed and tried to think of what acknowledgement was appropriate, and then realized that the simple act of thinking it was enough to tell him she had heard him.

Telepathy, clearly, was still something to get used to. His fingers smoothed through her hair, over her cheek, brushing the tears away. Cool against her flushed skin, and the contact only made her cling tighter to what was real, to someone who was still here and hadn't left, hadn't become strange. Hadn't turned into her nightmare, which brought on a twanging note of dissonant irony. He had started out as her nightmare.

Not anymore. She wasn't afraid of him anymore. She meant to prove it but he tucked her head firmly under his chin and kept her cradled in his arms. She wasn't thinking rationally. He was there for comfort, warmth, solidity. For companionship, nothing more right now.

"I'm sorry..." she whispered, although she was having trouble remember what in specific she felt sorry about.

"Shh..."

Everything was jumbled up and turned inside out and rocking around. She couldn't seem to keep her thoughts straight in her head, let alone her emotions. He steadied her as best he could, humming what sounded like some sort of lilting tune or lullaby. It took her a moment to realize that the humming was taking place inside of her head as well as out.

Not only a lullaby, a Wraith lullaby, or what passed for one among their kind. No words, apparently to a Wraith lullaby, only song and simplistic images. The comfort came, not from the lullaby itself, but from the sense that this was something he had done before. Teyla found herself thinking of Ellia, of Wraith children, and again wondering what Michael had left behind.

The song faltered, fell silent, if silent was the word for it.

No more of such things, for either of them. Not unless they somehow managed to carve out their own corner of the universe and make it safe for everyone they cared for, and that was passing unlikely. She felt his bitter smile in her mind more than against her hair, and held him a little tighter.

Thoughts like that, Teyla supposed, were why coming back to Atlantis didn't feel so much like home. Sheppard was still uncharacteristically quiet, his hands tense and tight on the controls as he flew them back. At least this time she knew why, and he knew what was happening, and there was no deceit between them. Only sharp and uncomfortable silences. Well, she supposed, that was better than the alternative. Maybe.

"John..."

"I don't want to talk about it."

Of course he didn't. She looked back out at the view ahead of them, exasperated. Spending time with Michael was looking to be more and more like a holiday and less like a ... whatever it had been when she'd started. A very bad idea.

"Are you..."

"Teyla, I am not fine with what you're doing. I'm definitely not fine with what you're doing, but if you've been sneaking out to see him for the past... god knows how long..."

That stung. She wondered if he had meant it to.

"And he hasn't done anything so far, given what he said the last time I ran into him, I'm willing to take your word that he's not a security risk."

Which meant he wouldn't tell Carter, or Ronon, or anyone else he didn't absolutely need to. Teyla slumped a tiny bit in relief.

"Thank you, John."

He shook his head, muttering. "Don't thank me."

Teyla thought he looked tired. Looked defeated, somehow, and she didn't want to think too much about the reasons why. That would imply all sorts of things that she had spent many months not letting herself think about, and. She wasn't going to start now. Not when she'd effectively made that particular choice.

Two months ago, if someone had told her she would choose a Wraith (as Michael would have been to her then, genetic modifications nonwithstanding) over John Sheppard, no matter what sense, she would have stared at them as though they'd gone mad.

She was half expecting the people on Atlantis to be staring at her as though she'd gone mad, and it wasn't until they started greeting her and asking how a non-existent mission went that she remembered Sheppard was covering for her. He answered in terse, clipped words and she in vague generalities until she had excused herself to go clean up and Sheppard had headed up to Carter's office.

It still felt strange to think of it as Carter's office. Teyla thought it would feel strange for some time. Elizabeth would have, she thought, at least tried to understand what was happening with Michael. She would have tried to work out some sort of solution. And Teyla had no idea what Colonel Carter would do, and that bothered her.

"Michael?"

Sheppard nodded, a tight and jerky motion. He didn't like it any better than she seemed to be taking it, but it was a fact he was going to have to deal with.

He didn't want to have to deal with it.

"Are you sure?" Carter seemed to be having trouble grasping the idea. Which, to be fair, Sheppard had had similar trouble when he had seen them around each other, seen Teyla acting the way she was.

He wasn't sure what way that was. Except that it was the kind of thing he didn't like, too close, too intimate. There were elements of don't you touch my sister to it, but there was also jealousy. It was the jealousy that bothered him most, he thought. The idea that Teyla was behaving around Michael in such a way as to make him jealous, implied that she was treating him like...

"I'm sure." Sheppard shook his head. "I'm sure it's Michael, anyway. I'm not sure what she's doing with him."

Carter didn't need to ask what he meant to see what was going on. She nodded, a look on her face that put Sheppard in mind of someone from logistics attempting to disarm a naquadah-enhanced bomb. "But she is going to see him."

Sheppard nodded. There wasn't much point in lying about it, not when he'd brought it to her. "I flew her there, the last time. And..." he shook his head. "The first time, after the crash. I think she was going to see him. At least partly, I don't know what's going on between them. But, she says he isn't a security risk."

"And you believe her."

He took a breath, let it hiss out in a sigh that slid from between clenched teeth. "I trust her judgment. He's had plenty of time to do something to compromise us, bring a Wraith cruiser down on our heads, kidnap our people and start experimenting on them again, whatever. And there's been nothing. I trust her judgment..."

Carter's eyes narrowed slightly, head tilting back. "Even when you think it's been compromised by her feelings for him."

Ouch. John winced at having it so blatantly there, out in the open. "Yes."

"All right." Although it took Carter a little while to say it. "For the moment, we'll let this go. It hasn't impacted her ability to work with your team..."

John winced again. "No, but if Ronon finds out..."

"We'll deal with that if and when it happens. For now, keep an eye on her, and if she feels a need to go to that part of the mainland, I want you to accompany her at least as far as the rendezvous point."

Something in the way she said it told Sheppard that she wasn't exactly unaware of the underlying emotions there. He wasn't sure if he was grateful or even more cautious as a result.

"Yes, sir."

Teyla was out on the balcony looking out over the water when he found her. Not at the continent, simply out at the horizon and wondering how her life had turned in the last visit. She had been back only a short span of hours on Atlantis and already she missed Michael. The quiet steadiness, the connection. Aspects to what they had and what they had done that she couldn't even name.

Yes, the romantic aspect too. She smiled a little when she thought of it, lowering her head a bit, and of course that was when John walked up and saw her. He winced, and looked as though he thought he should come back later.

"What did she say?" Of course, Teyla could guess who he had been to see.

He sighed. "She'll ..." Keep your secret, Teyla heard, and wondered for a moment if that was her own imagination filling in the blanks or if Michael's lessons had had unintended side effects. But she was damn well not going to ask. "Hold off on putting it on any official reports for now. And we'll let you tell the others."

This time it was Teyla's turn to wince. They both knew what would happen if Ronon found out on his own, and they both knew how he would react if she told him. Ronon had never liked Michael, even when he was human.

"Thank you."

"Don't thank me," Sheppard shook his head. "I still don't know if I'm doing the right thing."

Blunt, but honest at least. When she had been less than honest with him, although never with an outright lie. She nodded. In his position, she might have said or thought the same thing.

It must have hurt enough to show in her expression, because his hands were on her shoulders and now he was turning her to face him. "Teyla... I'm..." Sorry. Was what he meant to say, but she didn't need telepathy to tell her that. John had never been very good at saying what he felt.

Teyla smiled, turning his half-thought-through gesture into an expression of forgiveness, touching her forehead to his. He even smiled a little, which she counted as a minor victory.

"I am sorry, John." For hurting you. For endangering the city, for testing your trust in me so badly. "For everything."

"I know," John said, awkwardly, because he said everything emotional with just that little bit of awkwardness. And he sort of moved as though he wanted to hug her, but didn't. He didn't do hugs well, either. "Thanks."

After the third time or so they didn't bother hiding it entirely. Sheppard had known there was something to be jealous of long before he had known what it was, and while she sensed that Michael wanted to pay the other man back for what he saw as tempting him with things he wanted that he could never have, he respected her enough to refrain while Sheppard was watching.

Which didn't mean they did not touch, did not sink into each other's embrace with the sigh of relief and welcome. She was, at least for the moment, the only one who accepted him. She was his family, his Hive, his Queen, even (though neither of them so much as thought the shadow of the word) his beloved. His human, as he was her Wraith, or so they thought in terms of wry amusement. He didn't mind being her pet Wraith, it was one more way in which the people on Atlantis would never understand them, one more way to bind them closer together.

She, though, did not want them to be bound closer together by excluding her friends and adopted family. He was her comfort, her teacher, her friend and companion, and, yes, her lover. In time, she hoped more would come to know and accept what they had.

As they had accepted him the first two times? As they accepted her Wraith heritage, brought up only when it was useful and the rest of the time ignored?

She didn't know what else to do with that part of her, which softened his anger into something like pity, or an admission of loss. He didn't know what to do, either.

"In time, perhaps you could come back with me," she suggested. Not in the next few visits, but in a year or so, perhaps. There would be enough who knew, enough advocates that she could introduce him properly to her commander, that they could spend time together on Atlantis as well as here in his hidden enclave.

Michael was not so hopeful. "And do what. And how would I defend myself against your friends?" And by which he meant friend, and she didn't know how that would work out.

"He would listen to me," she said, but it wasn't as much use as it might have been considering he sensed her underlying lack of confidence in her words. She didn't know that Ronon would listen to her where Michael was concerned, and he could tell that. "He would at least take my feelings into account."

Her feelings for him. It softened Michael's temper more than a little, and his arms tightened around her. "That would be something, at least."

Teyla smiled a little at the thought of Ronon's expression when he realized what she felt for Michael. "He will not like it." Better to talk in terms of certainties than possibilities, both to take away the illusion that they could keep up the secrecy forever and to reinforce the hope that they could make some sort of life together. "I do not think he would believe it, not at first."

Michael's thought was a little more of a caricature and less of Ronon, himself. "He wouldn't. And he would try to talk you back to reason, as he sees it."

"This..." Teyla put the feeling behind the word even if she couldn't speak the word yet. "Has nothing to do with reason, but not in that way."

He appreciated that, with a rueful smile and another kiss. No more words, not for a little while, although thoughts of what his welcome in Atlantis would be continued to circle for a little while. They hit a snag when it came to the problem of sustenance.

"I doubt they would exactly ... open their doors to me and say, come in, have a snack." A mocking twist to his words made her wince. "And what happens when I become too weak to..."

Neither of them wanted to think of him starving to death. And yet it did also bring up another question, one that she hadn't yet been quite ready to ask until now.

"How have you been sustaining yourself thus far?"

Innocent tone, and if not so innocently meant then certainly she did not intend to cause the reaction she got. He didn't move, physically, his expression didn't change but the wave of emotions that surged through her and left her breathless, chest tight. Too many emotions to separate but all of them painful, wringing her out like a wet rag and she couldn't think, couldn't separate her emotions from his and she was getting lost and couldn't feel her skin on her body and

Her mind translated the separation as a steel wall slamming down so hard it rattled her teeth, although once she could think she recognized it as a metaphor. A visualization to represent the act of separating their minds at least enough for her to recover.

"What..." she gasped, trying for verbalization because she didn't think she could handle mind-to-mind communication yet. It was probably, if his expression was anything to judge by, a good idea. "What did you..."

He pushed himself to his feet, dislodging her, walking a little ways away.

It took her a moment to sort through the images; if she wasn't going to get any spoken answer from him and she wasn't yet ready to touch his mind, that was where the answers lay. The hunger had never been very acute when she was with him, and it wasn't now. She traced back the memories, before they fled, to a time when the hunger was sharper. What had he done to ease it. Upon what sort of creature had he fed?

A very familiar one. With a carapace, something resembling arms and legs, and she turned and looked at him with something that wasn't quite horror and wasn't far from it. His soldiers. He had brought them here, had imprisoned them, had been feeding on them so that he wouldn't need to hunt on Atlantis.

And yet.

"You felt it," she whispered, still grasping the implications. His army, with which he had been telepathically linked, and he had been killing and feeding on them. "You killed them, and..."

One hand clenched into a fist. She stepped forward, wrapping her hand around his, putting her arm around his waist.

It explained everything. Or at least, everything that had happened in the last five minutes; what the sequence of thoughts was that led up to his decision to round up a group of his soldiers, imprison them somewhere in the bunker, and use them as a food source, she didn't know. She wasn't sure she wanted to know. Desperation of some sort, maybe faint hope, maybe a peace offering. She didn't ask, and he didn't venture an opinion or a hint.

"Perhaps we should not try to make the others understand, just yet." Her voice sounded more hesitant than she wanted it to be, and yet she felt she was right. If she did not yet understand him as well as she thought, what hope did she have of trying to explain to anyone else what was happening between them? She was lucky, at the moment, that Sheppard and Carter were willing to take her at her word.

"It is a short term solution," he said, and his voice sounded rusty with disuse. "I can only sustain them for so long, and then..."

And then they would have to find some other way. Still. She appreciated that he had tried, very much, and with that and a bit of a wordless plea, he finally turned. She tucked her head to his shoulder and he eased his arms around her and sighed.

"We will look for a more long term solution, then."

We. A simple, short word, and yet one that carried a weight behind it, of commitment and promise to him. Determination. No specific words or concepts attached to it but she was linking her future to his by saying so, and she felt him wondering if she meant it. She did. She promised him that, too.

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