The Blindness

the last message

"Whats it doing?" Colonel Shepard asked when he ran into the control room everything was a buzz.

"Nothing yet." he was answered by Woolsey who was nervously looking over senor logs and various read out's.

"Rodney?" Shepard questioned.

"Nothing, the Hive dropped out of hyper space just outside of weapons range. It just sitting there..." McKay's words were cut off by a sudden beeping sound from the console in front of him. "Incoming data stream." McKay rolled acrossed the floor to another console. "Setting up an off network computer to receive it." it only took a few seconds to set up and receive the data stream. "It's not very big." he commented.

"Sir, the Hive is opening a hyperspace window."

"Let it go. I have a feeling Todd just wanted to say Hi." Shepard groaned as Woolsey stared at him. When he nodded in agreement, no one said anything until after the Hive was gone.

"How long until you figure out whats in it?" Shepard finally asked after everything calmed a bit.

"I can bring it up now, it's not encrypted." McKay hit a lot more buttons on the console as he worked before he turned to Shepard. "It's not encrypted, there doesn't appear to be any virus's, its just a message." he stared at Shepard sure of himself.

"Can you bring it up in Whoolsy'soffice?" Shepard asked as he looked at the commander of Atlantis who agreed, it probably should be viewed in privet. After a few minutes, the three men gathered in the office to view the message.

When they first brought up the display, it was the image of a human female, in Wraith leathers. Her dark colored hair was long and well kept. Her shin was pale but other than that, she appeared fairly healthy. What disturbed them most was the scars that covered almost her entire face, it looked as thou a rabid creature had clawed her face from cheek to forehead acrossed her eye's, then burnt the flesh all around the wounds. It healed into one massive scar that sealed her eye's closed, they couldn't be sure of anything more than that. When McKay commented that the image did not look like Todd, Shepard just told him to play it.

"When I sat down here I was still angry with you Colonel Shepard, you and all of Atlantis. But now that I'm actually making this message, all I can think to say is... thank you." the sound of a wraith hiss caused the image on the screen to pause for a moment. "Let me do this." the image of the female turned towards something out of the camera's vision.

"Very well." the voice was Wraith and Shepard immediately stopped the playback.

"I told you Todd had something to do with this, I'd know that voice anywhere." Shepard commented when he heard the Wraith's voice. When the other two in the room just stared at him, he sighed and started the playback again. The image turned back toward the camera and continued.

"As you can see my companions do not agree with my decision to send this message. But I needed to Thank you, for bringing me to pegasus, and thank you, for leaving me to the Wraith. Thank you for not searching for me, and thank you for finally letting Todd go. If you had not done any of these thing's, I would never have found my true home. I know that one day our paths will cross again, and when that day come's, I need to you to know that I harbor no ill will against Atlantis. I need you to know that earth, is safe. Those wraith I have come to call brother, have never asked me about my home world, and I do not believe they ever will. If you question weather or not they even know, I should tell you, all 278 wraith souls on board my Hive are well aware of the fact I was born a Lantian. They are loyal to me and I will be loyal to them until the day I die. I know your probably screaming mind-control right now, but please hear me out first. Your lieutenant Kayna Neric never survived that crash so long ago, what did, became something far greater than anyone could ever have been imagined. They call me Huntress, and I am Queen of my Hive now. It was not easy to gain the respect and loyalty of one Wraith, let alone a Hive full of them. But somehow, I managed to do it. Despite how much I hate being called Queen, I can not deny the fact that I hold that rank among Wraith. When we meet again Colonel Shepard I cant risk..." the image stopped and sighed several times before continuing.

"... I am no Lieutenant Ford, I am no threat to Pegasus, other then the usual Wraith one." the image smiled and took a deep breath. She nodded to something off screen, then continued. "I wont risk you taking me from my home or family. And I would prefer to have you as an allie." the image reached off the screen and picked something up when she leaned back into view she was holding a small child. "As you can see, I have every reason to stay in Pegasus, permanently." the child was playful and the image of the female handed him off to a set of wraith hands that took him carefully.

"Before you hunt Todd down and try to kill him. You really need to play out the timeline in your head, Shepard. You had him as a prisoner in your city when my son was conceived, had you believed him and let him search for me, I might be standing in Atlantis today. So thank you, Colonel, I own my son's life to you." the image took another deep breath.

"There never was anyone on earth to care that I was missing, I really cant blame any of you for being no different. I just wanted to make sure, that when we do meet again. You don't start a war by trying to separate me from my family, the Hive I call home, or the Wraith I have chosen as my mate and Parvana." the image turned to something off screen again and suddenly a growling image of the Wraith they all recognized appeared on the screen. It was Todd and Shepard groaned scornfully at the screen when he saw him. The image pulled the Wraith in close and kissed his cheek as he grinned uncomfortably in the view screen, the female giggled and released the upset Wraith, then turned back towards the screen.

"I could not have sent this message without his help, and I would really appreciate if you don't threaten his life, the next time you cross paths. I don't think I can do any of this without him, he has been with me ever since you released him, and I choose to stay with him, always." the image nodded to the Wraith they knew was out of view, then it turned back to the screen one last time.

 "I hope the delivery of this messagedid not cause any problem's, but I want to be certain you receive it. So I plan to send this in a data burst myself, I can only hope it finds you all in good spirits. Until the next time we meet, Lantian's. May we be allies when we do." the image nodded and the screen turned black. Shepard, McKay, and Whoolsy all looked at each other stunned, none of them knew what to say.