A/N: This was written before the second half of season three began broadcasting. Any similarities are purely coincidental. I would like to take this final opportunity to thank the people who sent in such lovely feedback. I am very happy that you enjoyed this story. Deepest thanks to Aslowhite for her beta and to Inkling for her inspiration.

Chapter Five

"I told him it wasn't safe to be tested!"

This is Zelenka, hanging alongside Beckett as a medical team loads an unconscious McKay onto a wheeled cot. The Czech holds a datapad, the screen of which is cracked in a dozen places.

Carson glances at the datapad and then at Radek. "Thank God your glasses have plastic lenses, Dr. Zelenka."

The Czech removes his specs and checks them briefly.

They hurry McKay towards the infirmary, accompanied by Sheppard, Teyla and Ronon.

"Never mind," Sheppard says. "What happened?"

"The sonic output regulator has two settings, one focused, one broadbeam. We were testing the focused effects on organic material, some bean plants that the botany division gave us. Against my advice, I might add. It is not a stable device, yet. The pinpoint beam suddenly expanded well out of its designated range."

He shrugs and looks around, apparently expecting everyone to understand what he's saying.

"Wrong place, wrong time," he paraphrases. "Rodney was struck by the sound and collapsed."

They have reached the infirmary and transferred McKay to a bed there. Beckett shoos away Zelenka, Sheppard and the rest, and pulls a curtain around McKay's bed. On assessment, he finds McKay's eardrums ruptured and blood leaking from both ear canals. Pupils normal. Vital signs within normal limits. No fractures or other obvious trauma. Carson orders a CAT scan. McKay's clothing is removed. He's given a complete head-to-toe exam and then dressed in a hospital gown. All the while, Radek speaks on the other side of the curtain of frequencies and of cellular disruption.

"It is more powerful than when Rodney brought the weapon back to Atlantis," Zelenka says. "This was our first test of the weapon, so I have no idea how it has affected him."

Two hours later, McKay opens his eyes for a little while. Carson knows he's being bothered by the hum, so he prepares a portable CD player and headphones. Once the 'phones are in place, he starts the first disk, Mozart's Piano Concerto #20 in D Minor.

Teyla sits by the bed for a long time. Ronon comes by. When McKay wakes up again, they speak to him. His expression confirms what Carson had feared.

OoOoO

Carson has already decided what he's going to do. He's still got the hum to remind him every day. Long after he's left McKay's bedside, late in the night, he walks the halls. Expansive windows overlook the inky-black ocean, which gives off an oily shine when the city lights hit it. He stares at his reflection in the glass, shadowed by ceiling lights behind him.

"Monster," he says to himself.

It's only a matter of time before the sound weapon is perfected. If McKay lets it go that far, if he's capable of fruitful work after this. He's not an evil man, but one driven by inquisitiveness and by Elizabeth's ambitions for him and for herself.

Sheppard sits on the floor outside Carson's quarters.

"You could have waited inside," the doctor says.

"Too forward," the Colonel replies, standing.

They enter together and Sheppard lurks by the door. He's never been in Carson's rooms and Carson's never been in his. This is quite probably enemy territory to John.

In the few weeks since they stumbled through the gate back here, Beckett and Sheppard haven't spoken with each other about anything important. John left the infirmary today shortly after Rodney was brought there. Looking at the Colonel's face now, the reason is obvious, for Carson's never seen anyone so weighted with regret.

Sheppard asks, "McKay's going to be okay?"

Carson sighs. "I think not." He cups a hand to his own ear. "Say wha' now?"

They still hate and like and appreciate and despise each other. Carson notes that Sheppard's wearing the low boots this evening, the canvas ones that make no noise.

"Look, Carson…"

"Say no more. I want to go back to Earth anyway. Might as well have a good reason for it, even if I get chucked on my ass in the process."

"Space it?"

"Yes. Destroy it in space."

They do this together. Zelenka has left the lab for the night; the weapon is locked up but not nearly so securely that Sheppard can't break in and acquire it. They find Zelenka's datapad with the broken screen and snatch that, as well.

They do this together. Carson's relaxed at the jumper's controls. It's easier to be calm and collected flying when Sheppard's around to set a calm, focused, goal-oriented example.

Elizabeth growls at them through their headsets until they switch off the comm and let her yell at herself for a while. The jumper stops in the disorienting openness of space.

The prototype weapon, the one that McKay brought back with him to Atlantis, hums a little even when it is switched off. Sheppard tapes the datapad and the prototype to each other. Then he tapes both of those things to the explosive. The datapad flashes a few times, as the screen tries to come back to life.

"You ready?" Sheppard closes the bulkhead doors.

"Ready, Colonel."

When the rear hatch is opened, the rear compartment decompresses, and the objects are blown out into the void. Carson propels the jumper away as Sheppard presses the activation button. The prototype and all of the information about it explode silently in the nothingness around them. A sound weapon is impotent in space, so this is a good place to kill it. Carson wonders what sort of noise it would have made if they'd blown it up on Earth.

They travel in silence for a while. Neither wants to return to Atlantis just yet. At sunrise Carson remembers that he has a patient in the infirmary who needs tending. He realizes that this is a patient to whom he will have to say goodbye.

OoOoO

Carson's lived alone in one end of the croft house for nearly two years. It's just the one room, with a bed, a table and chairs, a bookcase, a settee, the telly and some lamps here and there. A tiny kitchen takes up part of one wall. The fireplace and portable heater keep things warm enough. The other end of the croft holds the washer and dryer, the pantry, and supplies like light bulbs and laundry detergent, everything he needs.

Outside the winds make noise as they peel around the northwest corner, whistling when the gusts come up, moaning when the velocity turns lazy. This was his main reason for choosing to live here: ambient sounds keep the hum away. It isn't a hum like a child makes when she draws pictures at the kitchen table. It isn't the hum of the refrigerator. It isn't the hum of a 'jumper's drive pods. It is different from all of that, something deep inside his head that will always be there.

Three days a week, he drives into Lerwick to staff the walk-in clinic there. This is as far away from genetics as he can get. Carson likes his patients, who come in for skin rashes and for broken fingers and bronchitis. He uses aids in both ears when he works. They allow him to hear above the hum. That and a talent for lip-reading make most people perfectly understood.

Winter begins its long, slow melt into spring in late April. By the end of May, it's almost warm enough to go in shirtsleeves, but not quite. The Shetland Islands are all ragged coastline. He walks the edges of them, looking out over the ocean, which roils without end.

The croft house stands close to a high cliff edge. This afternoon Carson sits on a stool outside his back door, his favorite spot. His ears catch the wind blowing in off the water. No matter. He hears the squeak but, even before that, he sensed someone approaching.

"Hi, Doc."

"Hi, yourself, Colonel," he replies, without turning around.

"You're unlisted."

"Prank callers. Rodney?"

Sheppard looks out at the water. "He's okay. Still stone deaf. Does consulting. Sent along a letter," which Sheppard hands over.

Carson doesn't read it, just slips the folded paper into his back pocket.

"Tea, then?"

"Sure."

The wind moans around the corner of the croft house.

Carson puts on the satellite telly to a music channel, something light with lots of pianos. Good thing he lives out in the middle of nowhere, because the volume has to be very high in order to block out the hum. This time he keeps it dialed low so it won't bother John. Then he boils up some water and brings the tea and a plate of scones and jam to the table. They eat and drink and look out the little kitchen window.

"You didn't have to come here, Colonel. You could have left a message at the clinic."

John nods but otherwise doesn't respond.

"Why are you here?"

John gulps the last of his tea as if it were diner coffee. He continues to look out the window instead of at the man sitting three feet away. "I want to ask you... It's been a couple of years, so maybe it's alright to ask about this now?" There's just a little lifting hint of a question. Carson's hearing isn't always useful for much without the aids, but he picks up on what Sheppard's trying to say.

Carson rises and takes the teacups and plates to the sink. It's a cold-water tap, so he lets things soak for now, until he can heat some water on the fire.

"Ask away," he says.

"You didn't say anything to Elizabeth about when I got you out of the field hospital. About what you thought you saw."

"Devastating charges, Colonel. If they were true…"

"And you know that they would not have been…"

Beckett pauses at the sink, then he turns around and looks at Sheppard. The Colonel is leaning back in the dining chair, giving him a half-lidded stare that makes him look inhuman and raw.

Carson asks, "Why talk about this now?"

"They've gotten curious, again. I expect they'll be coming to ask you questions. I just wanted to get this clear between us."

"Steroids, Colonel. Hormones."

"And you?"

"A gun to my head every day."

"And McKay?"

He has to think about this, about what he knows about McKay, or what he thinks he knew about him.

Finally, Carson says, "Desperate times, desperate measures. He's gone overboard before."

"He's curious, too."

"Yes, that's part of it. Why else would he have taken an idea and gotten that far in only a few weeks?"

Sheppard continues to look at the doctor. It is chilling the room by degrees each minute he stays that way. Carson realizes that there will never be any going back for any of them, for John in particular. Whether from drug cocktails or from the weight of culpability, the results are the same.

Carson feels a great empty well open up inside him, because he wishes that things were different. At the same time, he wants Sheppard to just go away. Still, Carson's mother taught him to be polite, so he is that.

"So…you're back in the States?"

"Based there, yeah. I travel a lot."

Carson's heard about John's work and wonders how much of his humanity the Colonel has to submerge to do it. At least there's no confusion about who's side he's on; money motivates only a little less effectively than fear.

"Staying in town?"

"Yeah. Just for the night. Nice island."

"They're a series of islands, actually. The innkeepers will fill you in on local geological history. It's quite fascinating. Also, they serve good haggis, if you're interested."

Sheppard screws up his face and tips the chair to rightness. With a sigh, he rises and zips his jacket to the neck.

"Do you miss it?" he asks.

"Oh…" Beckett sighs. "Sometimes."

"When we took that thing into space…"

Carson smiles, remembering.

"I, uh…" John rubs the back of his head, making the hair there stick out. "We used to be…uh…"

"Friends?"

"Uh…yeah."

"It's not blown over yet, but maybe when it does," Carson says, and some small part of him, the part that loves and hates simultaneously, believes this.

He opens the door for John, who walks out into the evening mist that's blown in from the ocean. Carson can't hear the rental's engine turn over, but its headlights illuminate the fog that lies heavily over the croft and the land surrounding it.

When Carson closes the door behind Sheppard, it feels like the culmination of two years' hard work.

He takes the paper out of his pocket. Rodney's handwriting hasn't changed, which is strangely comforting.

"Hi, Carson," he has written. Then, "Mozart's Piano Concerto #20 in D Minor. That was the last thing I ever heard. I appreciate it. Thanks." At the bottom of the paper is an e-mail address.

Carson looks at the paper for a very long time. Then he tears it up and throws it in the kitchen trash can. He makes some more tea and wolfs down another scone. He's getting soft around the middle but he doesn't care. Doesn't care at all. It's just turned dark outside, not all that late. Still, he swallows a 20-mg Valium, readies himself and climbs into bed. In twenty minutes, he's asleep.

In the very early morning, he wakes and stares at the wood-beam ceiling above him. His quarters in Atlantis had lovely arching pillars in it, meeting right over his bed, like he was in a little church apse.

It takes a while to get out all of the things he's wanted to say over the past two years. He's not going to marry, he doesn't think, or have any wee ones to carry the precious gene that lives within him. No one will ever be close enough to him to know his secrets, so he tells them to the ceiling, and talks and talks and talks.

It's not ever going to be enough, though. The sun rises behind thick clouds. He has his morning tea and opens up a tin of biscuits. The wind whistles around the corner.

Rodney hasn't heard a thing in two years. He will never hear again.

Carson decides that it's time to refill the well. He goes to the wastebasket and takes out all of the bits of paper that he threw in there the night before. He puts them back together with tape and brings the thing over to his computer. He types in Rodney's e-mail address and spends the rest of the daylight typing and typing, telling Rodney everything that's been on his mind since the day they last saw each other. He tells Rodney about being arrested and returned to Earth, about the eventual offer to come home to Scotland and work like a normal person. He expresses his feelings about everyone they both know.

At day's end, Carson's gone ahead and written almost thirty pages. He feels much better and doesn't re-read anything that he's typed. Just highlights all of it and pushes the Delete button.

Then he re-sits himself and types in:

"Hi, yourself, Rodney…"

Then he pushes "Send."

FIN