“Captain, being held by you isn’t quite enough to get me excited.” - Princess Leia

By Wolfen Moondaughter
I had a disaster of Atlantis proportions in regard to this episode: the power went out while I was on vacation, so the VCR didn’t record it! Thankfully, I was able to buy the episode from Amazon Unbox, but the player doesn’t work so well when it comes to rewinding and fast-forwarding ….

Okay, so it’s obvious right off the bat, just from the title (”Tabula Rasa” = “clean slate”), that this is an amnesia episode — even if I hadn’t known the synopsis going in, I remember the fantastic Buffy episode of the same name, in which all the Scoobies lost their memories. Other than the fact that there’s mass-amnesia and this is also a great episode, though, that’s where the similarities end. I’m glad they did a story like this — usually amnesia stories deal with only one person, so having everyone have it adds a far less explored dynamic to that plot device. Even when Stargate SG-1 dealt with multiple cases of amnesia (”Beneath the Surface”), it was in a very different way.

What an amazingly creepy, yet wonderfully funny episode! And it did something I didn’t think was possible: it made me warm up to the McKay/Brown ship. Well, get more tolerant/appreciative of it, anyway. I’d still rather see him with someone else (and no, not necessarily Sheppard), but I’m starting to see some positives to it, story- and character development-wise. More on that in a moment ….

4.6: “Tabula Rasa”

There’s really creepy music here, as we find a panicked, bewildered-looking Rodney tied to a desk, with Ancient writing on his arm. (I’m lovin’ this ep already!) Clearly we’ve come into a story already in progress. He finds a computer pad with a note on it, telling him to “press here”. He turns the device on and sees himself on the screen, telling him that he’s the one who tied himself to the desk, that there’s no time for explanations. He’s told that he needs to focus — and to find a knife under his chair to set himself free, which he does. Then he’s told that he needs to find “this woman” and is shown a picture of Teyla. The recorded Rodney doesn’t know where she is, but rattles off some places to look. He tells himself not to trust anyone — and to hurry, because hundreds of people will die otherwise. This whole scenario reminds me of something, in a déjà vu sort of way, but I can’t pinpoint what. (Which, under the circumstances, is entirely appropriate, I suppose. *Grin*) At any rate, talk about a story sucking you in and fully immersing you from the get-go!

It’s now 14 hours earlier. Rodney’s visiting Katie Brown in the botany lab; she’s just gotten back from visiting their new mainland with her fellow botanists, and brought back plant samples. One of the samples is a cactus-looking thing, which she’s named after Rodney. (Oh so very appropriately, too, considering how “prickly” he can be. Although … Rodniana Villosa=”Hairy Rodney”, not prickly. Which, going by what Hewlett has said about having to shave himself a bit for A Dog’s Breakfast, is also true!) While Rodney doesn’t seem thrilled with the plant itself, he’s deeply touched (and dare I say amazed) at the gesture.

He asks her to lunch, and she’s honestly receptive to the idea, but begs off, saying she’s not feeling well. Despite his raging hypochondriac tendencies, he insists on escorting her to the infirmary. (Oh yeah, he’s got it bad now! And isn’t he absolutely adorkable throughout this whole sequence!)

So like I started to say a bit further back, I was never really a fan of Katie Brown as a love interest for Rodney. While I acknowledge part of my distaste towards her stems from the McShepper in me, it’s also because she’s just so … mousey, so timid and eager to please, which, however nice and sweet she is, I find supremely irritating in any individual. She also just doesn’t seem someone he’d have anything in common with. While I don’t want him with Sam, I picture him with someone more Sam-like, someone who can match him in the brains department and shares his interests. Someone who can put him in his place when necessary (although I do think Sam goes a little too far in that department — which doesn’t bother me, as it’s also very funny when she does). Rodney’s so clearly uninterested in plants (they fall too far into the realm of “soft science”, I think, as well as share to much territory with medicine — or, as he calls it, voudou), that I have a hard time seeing him being able to respect Katie, and respect is an integral part of any relationship, romantic or otherwise.

All that being said, it’s really charming to see him trying so hard to be interested in what she does, and expand his horizons, allowing us, in turn, to see a very rare side of him: one that seeks to please others for selfless reasons. And she gives his self-esteem a necessary boost — he knows he’s brilliant, but I think it’s more important for him to know that people can like him for himself, not just for what he can do for them (which is the cornerstone of pretty much any good fanfic I’ve read where he’s a lead character). He’s still obviously amazed that she does like him — in the past, that very point made me question whether he was really interested in her or just opening up to her attentions like a flower to the nourishing sun.

For example, in “Duet”, he seemed almost desperate, in a “Oh, somebody finally wants to go out with me!” sort of way, and was nervous of screwing up a rare opportunity — it could have been anyone who might ask him out. He even considered Cadman for a moment in that episode (and if I recall, there originally was more along those lines in that scene, that was cut out). In “Sunday”, he seemed less interested in being with Katie specifically than in just getting out of his playdate with Carson, using her as a convenient excuse, having ignored her a bit before then (save for having mentioned her at lunch once, and perhaps that was just to remind everyone that he had a girlfriend). But now his affection for her seems to be blossoming in turn. It’s still very awkward (which is also very endearing) between them, as he’s clearly doing things he doesn’t really want to in an effort to please her, but those efforts are more for her now, instead of just an effort to keep a girlfriend for appearance’s sake. He even states as much in the infirmary, to Keller, “Oh, we’re not here for me — I’m here for her, now.”

And she’s starting to be marginally less of a plot device whose sole purpose is to be there to build Rodney’s character … which I realise now is the primary reason I didn’t really like her before! I want Rodney to be with someone who is a person (read: established character) in her own right! But Katie’s slightly more proactive now, instead of just being reactive, which helps immensely.

Yeah, yeah, I know, back to the review …. Keller informs Katie that a number of other people have come down with the same symptoms (headaches, dizziness), including someone from the botany department. When Katie waves hi to the man (Gerald Baxter), Rodney scowls, asking who he is. (I’m not really sure if it’s jealousy on his part, or just him being perplexed because he simply can’t remember the guy.) Keller also tells Rodney that he has to stay, as he’s been exposed to whatever Katie has.

Elsewhere, Carter informs Sheppard that a team has found remnants of a Replicator vessel around a planet: it seems the Wraith are fighting back. Still, Sheppard points out that the Replicators won’t be an easy enemy to defeat. (Which doesn’t bode well for our heroes any more than it does for the Wraith ….)

Keller radios Carter about the current medical situation. She’s ordered a quarantine for the entire infirmary level, as it seems Brown’s survey team brought back a bacteria that Keller has never seen before. She’s going to look for it in the Ancient database. (I wish they would call it the Akashic Records; that would be so cool!) She wants everyone who went to the mainland to be brought to the infirmary for testing. (But what about everyone they’ve been in contact with since? Shouldn’t they all be brought in too, as a precaution, the way Rodney was made to stay?) A man in a lab-coat (who appears a number of times in the ep — I like when we get to know the incidental characters a bit, like we did in “Adrift”) tells Keller that test results show that he, she, and Rodney are all infected as well, but that so far the symptoms are mild, so it may not be a big deal.

A flash of light, and we jump to the present. Anmesia!Rodney is wandering around the empty halls of Atlantis when he stumbles across first a dead body, then a paranoid, metal-rod-toting Zelenka. Through Zelenka, we learn that the cities soldiers are hunting people down and taking them away somewhere for reasons unknown, and that he’s met a couple of others who also don’t remember who they are. He also doesn’t recognise Teyla when Rodney shows him the data pad with her picture, and figures she’s probably been captured. He tries to get Rodney to come with him, but Rodney insists he needs to find Teyla, even if he doesn’t know why. Disgusted, Radek leaves him to his own devices. The whole bit is quite funny and very, very intriguing. Why are the soldiers after them?

10 hours earlier, Rodney has an amusing exchange with Keller; he has what he considers to potentially be a news symptom of their illness, but she obviously thinks he’s just being a hypochondriac again, and dismisses it. (For a man who thinks so little of medicine as a science, he sure spends lot of time in the infirmary it seems!) Rodney goes to check on Katie, who’s drinking something a nurse in a hazmat suit gave her. She hands it to Rodney, so he can put it down on the bedside table for her. He asks how she is; her headache is worse. He asks if he can do anything for her; she asks for tea. Perplexed, he picks up the cup and politely asks what’s wrong with the one she has. Confused, she takes it from him. (And it starts …) There’s a crash nearby; the nurse has fallen over. The nurse in the hazmat suit. How is that even possible, that she could get sick wearing that? (For that matter, why hasn’t the city gone into lockdown, like it did in “Hot Zone”?)

Sam essentially asks my hazmat suit question for me in the next scene; Keller conjectures that she may have been infected before she put it on, but that would mean the sickness has already spread farther in the population than they’d realised. (I’m relieved writer Alan McCullough didn’t try to come up with some wacky science that would make a hazmat breach plausible. On the one hand, I suppose it would have been scarier to make a hazmat breach possible, but on the other, the less you have to ask the audience to suspend disbelief, the better. And the notion that the illness has already spread well beyond containment is scary in its own right!) Keller tells Sam (and John, who’s in Sam’s office) that she’s got off-duty medical personnel (read: they haven’t been in the infirmary lately) doing random blood tests to determine how far the illness has spread. She also says that the plants the botanists brought back have all tested negative for the bacteria, but she can’t figure another source. (Did she test the Rodniana Villosa? Katies said it had been hiding under another plant, and considering it has spines, it could have injected something into the bloodstream ….) She also recommends suspension of ‘Gate travel (I would call that a given).

Rodney’s eating from a TV dinner-style tray resting on Katie’s bed. (Hey, wait, is that her food??) She wakes up, and he cheerfully asks her how she’s feeling. Still seeming confused, she says she doesn’t know. As he chatters on, telling her that dinner is a Salisbury steak and that her friend Dr Baxter’s fever has broken, I’m waiting for her to ask “Who are you?” Instead she asks who he’s talking about. Rodney thinks he’s just gotten the name wrong, as he so often tends to do. (The fact that he’s actually right goes to show how much attention he pays to what she says! Goof for you, Rodney!) Then she asks where she is. Puzzled, Rodney says the infirmary, where he’d brought her. “Who are you?” she finally asks, and Rodney finally gets that something is seriously wrong.

Time to go back to the future, Dr Brown! (Don’t hit me; I couldn’t resist!) Amnesia!Rodney is found by the soldiers; Lorne zaps him with a Wraith stunner and orders his men to “put him with the others”. As they carry Rodney off, Lorne shares pills with a remaining soldier. Okay, so are the pills protecting them from the symptoms, or keeping them from even getting the sickness? At the very least, I’m guessing they’ve been charged with the task of rounding up those who have lost their memories, and are not actually acting with malicious intent. As they walk off, we see that Rodney’s data pad has fallen under a cushy chair in the hall (which the camera had lingered on in the beginning of the scene. I appreciate things like that — I think it’s the mark of a good director.)

8 hours earlier, Sam updates Sheppard, telling him that 6 blood tests from people in six different areas all came back positive: it seems the entire base is infected. Shep points out that he feels fine; Sam says she does too, which suggests that a delayed incubation time allows the illness to become widespread before anyone can even notice that they’re sick. Keller radios, saying that she’s sending brain scans of Katie and four other patients that are showing signs of amnesia. (Why did she need to specify Katie? That seems odd. Why not just say “five patients”?) She says that the illness makes cells produce a hormone that interferes with the brain’s ability to retrieve episodic memory. She reveals that, the longer a person is sick, the worse it gets (until it may be untreatable?), and that the amnesia first starts about six hours after the onset of the headaches. She also reveals that she started getting the headache about half an hour before, and that she figures they’re about to get overrun with patients in an already crowded infirmary. Sheppard comes up with the idea to us the mess hall as another infirmary; Keller and Sam agree, since it will help keep everyone in a central location for treatment.

In the present, Amnesia!Rodney wakes in the mess hall, surrounded by an equally-forgetful crowd. They tell him that the soldiers brought him and everyone else there, for their own protection, and locked them inside. (A this point I’m thinking Lorne and the other soldiers must have somehow avoided infection) Rodney remembers about his computer, realizing he no longer has it. He asks the crowd about Teyla, but of course none of them remember her, and she’s not there with them. (I’m half expecting one of them to say they don’t even remember who they are, so she actually could be among them!)

We’re back in the past. (Hey, they didn’t tell us when this time! Well, at least we have the flash of light to tell us we’ve shifted in the timeline again.) Ronon is helping Sheppard bring a gurney into the mess hall. Ronon asks the question of why the city hasn’t gone into lockdown. Sheppard doesn’t know — but he’s getting a headache. He walks off just as Teyla comes up. Ronon remarks to her that he feels fine, and wonders how they know he’s infected when his blood wasn’t tested. Teyla feels fine too, and also wasn’t tested, but she points out that they were exposed. He in turn points out that being exposed doesn’t mean you’ll get sick. She suggests he bring his observations to Keller. (Heee! He seems to like that idea.) Ronon may not be too good with scientific knowledge, but he’s apparently good at deductive reasoning. (I’m so proud of him!)

He hurries into the infirmary. Keller tells him she’s busy, at first. (Now, now, Jennifer, why do you assume he’s approaching you for frivolous reasons?) He ignores the dismissal, telling her he’s not sick. She doesn’t get what he’s telling her, pointing out that if he was lucky enough to avoid exposure before, he just blew it. He elaborates (hey, he’s not a talkative guy, this is probably hard for him), saying that he’s been working with sick people all day and still showing no signs of being sick. She finally realises that he’s suggesting he may be immune and feels the glands in his throat. (Did any other of the hundred or so infected people show signs of swollen glands, or are you just looking for an excuse to touch him, doc? It’s cute how far she has to reach up to do it, since he towers over her! Hell, the whole scene is cute!) She says she’ll need blood samples; he nonchalantly tells her to take as much as she needs.

In the present, Keller finds Rodney writing on his arms; he explains that he needs to do it to remember, as he can feel himself still forgetting things. At first I wonder at this — why would he forget something he’s learned after the fact? Then I realise the hormone production is ongoing, so the memory loss would be too. Okay, so I’m slow on the uptake. It’s a neat concept, though, having the amnesia be continuous, rather than just a wipe-out of memory from a singular point!

Rodney tries to rally the people around him to help him escape, but they’re understandably reluctant; even if the soldiers didn’t lock them up to protect them, and shouldn’t be trusted, they don’t know what’s out there. He insists that’s exactly why they need to go; they need to find out what’s happening to them and find the woman. He can’t remember her name, but Sam comes forth, reminding him that it’s “Teyla”. She agrees with him, suggesting that maybe the soldiers don’t know any more than they do, and saying they need a plan.

Ooooh, I hadn’t considered that! What if they’re just rounding up the people and herding them to the mess because that’s the last memory they have, the sense that it’s important to do it? Their first priority is to keep people safe, so it makes sense that their sense of duty might stay with them even if they can’t remember the whys!

Back in the past, John catches up with Rodney, who reveals that, as the latest batch of random blood tests came back all positive, there didn’t seem to be a point in quarantining the infirmary anymore. (Uh, how about to keep a bunch of people who are expected to lose their memory from wandering the halls, and, like Keller said, keep them collected in one place for treatment??) They admit they’re both having headaches. Rodney bets John five bucks that John will lose his memory first. (As others have pointed out, it’s starting to look like Rodney’s got a gambling problem: he’s made bets with people in “Tao of Rodney”, “The Arc”, and “Doppelganger”! Is it really that he’s gambling, though? It seems to me more like it’s a manifestation of his competitive nature, a need to prove that he’s better at something — I mean, it’s not like he needs the money. But really, Rodney, don’t you have enough jeopardy in your life every day??) I love John’s little “Rodney, wha ….” I wonder what he was going to say before they stumbled across Sam ….

They talk with Sam about preparations. Rodney suggests that all non-essential personnel be ordered to the mess hall, since they’re going to end up there eventually, and “this way, we won’t have people with no memories wandering the hallways.” (Some people are pet psychics — I’m apparently a fictional character psychic! *Laughs*) Sheppard agrees, saying he’ll have Lorne handle it. (Well, that confirms why the soldiers keep rounding everyone up!) Sam hands them bottles of stimulants, saying that they hope it will delay the memory loss. This explains why Lorne and the others were popping pills, but did they end up rationing it for just the soldiers eventually, due to a limited supply? Because obviously it didn’t work on Sam or Rodney in the long run. Rodney balks, asking what’s in them, afraid for his allergies. Sheppard tells him to just take them. (Which strikes me as a bit callous. Granted, I suspect many of Rodney’s allergies are psychosomatic, but what if they aren’t? Not to mention Keller had expressed reluctance to give Rodney stimulants in “Doppelganger” because it could lead to pulmonary failure — stimulants + hypertension = bad. Hell, he shouldn’t even be allowed coffee, really!) Sam also says she’s ordered Zelenka to remove the control crystal for the ‘Gate, so that they don’t risk spreading the illness to Earth.

Ronon goes to the infirmary. He notes Baxter is still there; apparently they’d been moving everyone to the mess hall, but Keller says Baxter’s too ill to be moved. Ronon asks if she’s found anything; she doesn’t know what he’s talking about. He reminds her that he’s not sick. She starts to feel his glands, saying he may have a natural immunity, and he tells her they’ve been over this already. (I love how he calls her “Doc”!) She realises she’s losing her memory now — just in time for Baxter to go into convulsions. She can’t remember what to give him at first, and even when she does, it doesn’t help. Neither does the crash cart. Things have just gotten a whole lot more serious! (What great tension!)

Back in the present (again, they’re not giving us any note as to when we are), Lorne and his men are leading a woman to the mess. When he opens the door, a herd of people charge out of the room. The soldiers open fire on the lot, but don’t manage to hit Sam and McKay. The duo stop for a much-needed breather. (Rodney says his lungs are about to give out; you’d think he’d be in much better shape after all this time. Maybe Ronon should drag him running ….) Sam asks where they can find “her” — Rodney asks who. She taps his hand, saying “Teyla, the one we risked our lives for!” (Can she remember better because she was probably infected after him, or because he’s bad at names to begin with? *Wink*) He doesn’t know, of course, so Sam says they’ll just have to search room by room. “How big can this play be?” And then she steps out onto a balcony and sees the city lights surrounding them. (Heeee, that’s perfect!)

In the past, Ronon and Sheppard and a few other guys escort some civilians to the mess. The civilians protest — they can’t remember what’s going on — but they don’t fight. John starts to go down the wrong corridor, when Ronon stops and points out the mess is a different way. John tries to brush it off, saying it’s easy to get turned around there. (Now, now, John, I wouldn’t expect you to be in denial, especially when you’re not the only sick one!) John updates Sam, saying he thinks they’ll need to start using stunners; Sam’s not happy, but she agrees, knowing that people are starting to lose their memories and “probably can’t understand why a bunch of soldiers are after them.” John tells Ronon to come with him.

In the armoury, John and Ronon find Lorne popping pills; John warns the man to ease up, and Lorne points out that if they all lose their memory, “there’s no coming back.” John nods, then says he has an idea. But we don’t get to see what the idea is.

In the present, Rodney asks Sam if they haven’t come down this corridor before. He gets the idea to mark their way (which immediately makes me think of Sarah marking the stones with lipstick in Labyrinth), but Sam points out what I’m thinking: that even if they see the markers, they won’t remember that they were the ones who left them. (Can’t he make a note on his arms to pay attention to the markers on the walls, though?) They run across a wary Zelenka. Rodney’s made a note about “the little guy with glasses” on his arm, so he decides to approach the man. Radek has the datapad with Teyla’s face on it. Luckily, Rodney remembers how to turn it on without a note to help him (Zelenka even asks him how he knew, but of course Rodney has no idea). They tell Zelenka that they’re looking for the woman on the screen; he seems willing to help, but asks how they’re going to do that.

In the past, we see Keller holding a meeting with Sam, John, Rodney, Ronon, and Teyla. She’d given up looking in the Ancient database, instead focusing on studies Carson had made of the Athosians, since Teyla seemed immune. She found a very similar bacteria from the record of a ten-year-old boy who had suffered from an illness she couldn’t remember the name of. “Keirson’s Fever?” Teyla prompts (or something like that — do you think I have a copy of the script?) Keller says that’s it. Teyla explains that it’s a common childhood illness that she had when she was eight; Ronon had it at ten. (Sounds like the Chicken Pox.) Teyla protests that the fever doesn’t affect adults, nor does it produce memory loss; Keller insists that the bacteria are too similar.

Rodney agrees, pointing out that the city didn’t recognise it as a threat. He conjectures that the Ancients brought it to the planet long ago when they were exploring, and because they didn’t leave a Startgate there, the bacteria became trapped and mutated over the centuries, which was why the symptoms had changed. (This also explains why a no one got sick when the Athosian child had the illness, but they’re sick now). Keller agrees, saying that it would explain why Ronon and Teyla would be unaffected, since they had the antibodies to the original strain. (I’m iffy on this one: you have to get new flu shots to combat new strains every year, after all. But then again, sometimes they don’t guess the precise strain and yet it still works. Okay, I guess I’ll go with it.) Sam asks if Keller can use those antibodies; she says she can’t, it would take to long to reverse-engineers a cure, or even if it’s possible. (Carson was the geneticist, after all — that may not be an area of expertise for Jennifer.)

Teyla suggests that they could use the sap of a common plant, saying that her people used it to treat the Fever with great success. John’s eager to go get it, but Ronon points out that they disabled the gate. (Such a smart guy!) Teyla asks where Zelenka put the control crystal. We see Lorne ordering soldiers about. John radios him asking if he’s seen Zelenka (we can assume John’s tried Zelenka already in the scene gap); Lorne has, but the man whacked one of them with a metal rod and gave them the slip. (aaah, it’s all coming together now ….)

Sheppard and crew go looking for him, until Rodney points out the futility of trying to find a man with amnesia, who probably wouldn’t remember where the control crystal is anyway. Shep suggests they use the ‘jumpers, but Rodney points out that it’s the control crystal they need, not the DHD — they can’t create a stable wormhole without it. Ronon suggests they go to the mainland, and Teyla agrees, saying the plant they need may very well be there. (Katie already established that the botanists found mostly the same plants on this world as were found on Lantea, so there’s already basis in the story. Nice set-up!) John asks how they’ll distribute it once they find it (I guess he’s working under the notion that they might not find everyone? ‘Cause if they’re all in the mess, tea would be the easiest and most obvious choice. But I’m thinking they’re going to go for the ventilation system.) An unhappy Rodney says he’ll figure something out (ventilation, Rodney!) and goes off to do his thing. Teyla says she’ll go with him, asking Ronon if he knows what to look for. Ronon says it grows like a weed on Sateda. (Do you think the Satedans have anything like pot? Has Ronon done any drugs besides alcohol? You know, sometimes I am far too easily sidetracked ….)

In the ‘jumper, John looks around uneasily. Ronon points him to the pilot’s seat and assures Sheppard that he can fly it. “It’s in your blood — literally.” (Love that line!) John doesn’t look too convinced, though, and perhaps rightly so, as he knocks into the wall on the way out.

In the lab, Rodney’s losing track of what he’s doing. Teyla tells him that they intend to aerosol the cure and spread it to the ventilation system (what did I tell ya?), and at the moment, he’s trying to override the protocols that regulate temperature, humidity, etc. Now that he knows what he’s supposed to get done, he thinks it’s a piece of cake — until the computer beeps at him. He’s disturbed, realizing that he’s losing it now too, saying his memory was bad to start with. “I once forgot Mother’s Day five years in a row!” (You know, if it weren’t for being bombarded by the media about it, I would forget too, I’m sure of it.) Teyla asks him what the ratio of the circumference of a circle to its diameter is, and he rattles off the numbers of Pi, saying it’s easy and doesn’t count. She assures him that he is a scientist, and science is what he will hold on to the longest. (Gee, just like I was thinking about the soldiers ….) Rodney seems reassured for a moment, then pauses. “Wait a minute. Doesn’t that make me a really bad person?” (Heeeeee! I like that Rodney, at his barest element, is bothered by this possibility, rather than not caring!) Clearly at the edge of her patience, Teyla tells him it makes him the person who will save all their lives.

In the present, Rodney, Sam, and Radek have come across the infirmary, but Teyla isn’t there. The place looks like it’s been ransacked. (Huh? Why? Was there a struggle between soldiers and the few medical staff members left?) They hear soldiers coming and go into hiding, but Lorne and his companions turn out to be searching for more pills, not them, and leave. Sam tells her companions she has an idea, and they follow after. Once again, we aren’t told what the idea is.

Back in the past, Ronon and Sheppard land on the mainland. John’s forgotten their purpose. Tired of explaining himself, Ronon stuns Sheppard (”Never gets old,” he says, and I’m in stitches), then ties him up. He apologises (flippantly), and goes off on his mission alone, sealing the door behind him. (You know, they really need to develop an interface with for non-gene-carries to use the ‘jumper, the way the Travelers mean to do with that Ancient ship. I mean, I know it creates tension for the story, but it really doesn’t makes sense for them not to ….)

In the lab, Rodney is almost finished, when Teyla hears a noise and goes out to investigate. Lorne and his men come across her, and, despite her protests, move to take her captive. The manages to fight them off (she kicks ass!) and runs. Rodney realises she’s gone, his fear written plainly on his face. Lorne and the other chase after Teyla, and stun her just before she reaches a transporter. (Close, yet so far! What a bummer!) back in the lab, Rodney makes the preparations we saw him benefit from in the beginning, coming full circle. (Clever, really, and just in time: he probably forgot everything right after tying himself up! Teyla wasn’t kidding about him being the one to save them all, even if this isn’t what she meant: just think of how screwed they all would have been if he hadn’t done that? Well, I guess at this point we don’t know for sure they would be screwed at all, because they haven’t actually found Teyla, but still ….)

We see Teyla in one of the holding cells. (Are we in the present? The past? I suppose it doesn’t matter anymore, which seems weird in and of itself, but by the time sthe scene is over, I know it’s the present from here on out.) Lorne comes in, wanting to know what she’s done to his people, and not believing she’s not the one responsible, he pops a pill, and she realises that the stimulants have made him go (in the vernacular of Vala Mal Doran) “wonko”. (Poor Lorne: first an alien entity makes him paranoid in “Doppelganger”, and now an alien bacteria does the same! And Heightmeyer’s not around! Do you think they replaced her yet? ….)

Sam zaps Lorne from behind, with a stunner. Teyla calls them all by name, as much for their benefit, knowing that they’ve forgotten the names themselves, as a greeting. She asks how they found her, and Sam says they followed “him”. (At first I think she means Zelenka, and I’m confused — then I realise she means Lorne. So that’s the idea she had!) Rodney doesn’t know how to open the door, and that’s when I realise the purpose behind the Ancient writing on his arm. Sure enough, he looks at his arm (psychic!), and opens the door. Teyla hurries out, and they follow.

Back on the mainland, Ronon come back with bags full of the weed, only to find the door open and Sheppard gone. (You just know Sheppard’s hiding nearby and waiting for Ronon to go into the jumper.) Ronon runs into the ‘jumper, dropping his bundles and confirming that John’s not in there. He walks back out, powering up his blaster, when Sheppard creeps up behind him and aims his gun at him. (Well, okay, I was close.) He makes Ronon drop the blaster and step back, then asks who the man is. Hands raised, Ronon tells him he knows how he must be feeling, and says he would be scared if he were in Shep’s place. (Awwww!) When John pulls back on the safety, Ronon says they’re friends and have been through a lot, and no disease can erase that. (Death by warm fuzzies!) But it doesn’t work — John suspects Ronon was the one who tied him up (well, he’s not wrong!) and won’t give him the gun. Ronon says fine, shoot, but hen he’ll be all alone (Ronon’s worst fear!) with no idea of who he is, yadda yadda, that nothing he could do to John would be any worse. Poor John looks miserable in his uncertainty (woobie!), and concedes Ronon’s point (because let’s face it, Ronon’s got a lot of common sense for a Neanderthal!), lowering the weapon.

Back at the lab, Teyla sits Rodney down in front of one of the laptops and, after a funny back and forth, convinces him to finish the job. Apparently all it takes to finish the program is for him to hit one button: enter. (I figure that, when he made the video message for himself, he’d actually forgotten what that last step was already!) Now all that remains is for Ronon and John to bring the plants back. Teyla says as much, prompting her three companions to, after a comic pause, ask simultaneously, “Who?” (I told you it was a funny ep!)

Thanks to the sensors, soldiers know someone is flying to the city, but they don’t know if it’s friend or foe. When Ronon and Sheppard exit the jumper, they hold them at stunnerpoint, and refuse to listen to Ronon’s insistence that they bring medicine. Lorne has found his way there. Ronon tells him to look in his pocket; inside, Lorne finds a photo of John that says that John is his commanding officer, and to trust him. (Aha! So that was John’s idea!) John tells them , in a rather comic fashion, to listen to what he says. Lorne asks what his orders are. (Tell them to do what Ronon says, I think.) “Do what he says,” John tells them, gesturing to Ronon. (This is fun! And if it means the story is just really predictable, I don’t care: I’m enjoying it.) Ronon takes his blaster back, picks up a bag, and tells them to follow.

John wakes up in an infirmary bed, wearing scrubs. Teyla and Ronon visit; they tell him that after Teyla released the cure through the ventilation system, it knocked everyone out, hitting some harder than others (This explains why there are doctors up and about, but I would have thought, since John was among the later ones to get infected, that he would have been one of the first to be cured ….) John learns that he’s been out for about a day; she says he feels okay, if a little fuzzy. They tell him Lorne feels badly about what happened, and the photo was a good idea: if the cure had been delayed any longer, many more people would have died. John is disconcerted — people died? After a pause, he asks, worried, “Where’s McKay?” (Did you hear me squee? I think they heard me in Tokyo. I wouldn’t be surprised if a few other McSheppers fainted outright.)

Of course Rodney didn’t die. (Hell, I’m shocked that there were people who didn’t know about Carson biting the big one before “Sunday”. Spoilers are one thing, but how on earth do people avoid casting news?) We see him sleeping at Katie’s bedside, his hand under hers. (My heart breaks for him. Katie dying wouldn’t surprise me; before the episode, I would probably have even been happy. But now? Well, maybe I’d get over it quick, but it would actually make me sad, since it’s obvious here that Rodney’s come to care for her a great deal.) Keller wakes him, telling him he should get some rest and she’ll call if there’s a change, but he insists (while looking like death warmed over) that he’s fine where he is. She assures him that Katie’s still fighting, and walks away.

(Even without Katie dying, this skirts dangerously close to “Women in Refrigerators” territory — particularly the concern of how a female character is often injured just to give a male character angst. Yet I don’t really mind, since her main purpose was to help develop McKay in the first place — it would be far worse to injure or kill a major character like Teyla or Sam, with their own firmly established role in the series outside of his life, just to generate angst for him. And, well, if you’ve been keeping up, you know how much I love angst, particularly when applied to my favourite characters, and Rodney is at the tippy-top of my list! Anyway, it’s just an observation. Hell, I’ve been guilty of it myself in some stories ….)

Katie strokes Rodney’s hand. He calls Keller back over, and Katie wakes up. At first it seems as though she may have lost her memory — it’s clear Rodney thinks so, and while I can’t say I would miss her terribly if she was sent home because of it, I’m sad for him. And then Katie calls him by name, and the relief on his face, plus the beaming smile on hers, makes me smile too. I’m actually happy with the ending. (What can I say? I’m a happy-endings kind of gal!)

Whew! Went a little long there! See you next Monday, for my review of “Missing”!

Wolfen Moondaughter is on the editorial board for the comics industry webzine Sequential Tart for which she has written since late 2001. She’s also written for Newtype USA, contributed to Andy Mangel’s book Animation on DVD, self-published a novel (Memory of the Brightwing), and one of her short stories, “Chase”, is due to be published soon as the title story in an anthology from Wapshott Press (under the pen name Anastasia Witchazel). She’s an artist, too, having done spot illustrations for Dragonlance, a few panels for Barb Lien-Cooper’s webcomic series Gun Street Girl, and private commissions. In her spare time, she’s a fanficcer/fanartist. See more of her work at her site, Wolfen’s Webworld.

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