Ring Inoculation by 2ndary_author (first aid challenge)

[2ndary-author.livejournal.com]

Title: Ring Inoculation
Author: 2ndary_author
Fandom: Stargate: Atlantis
Characters: The season 1 gang
Rating: PG-15
Notes: This is the fic I really meant to write! Started for another challenge (guess which!), but then it morphed.

Summary: Heaven is our heritage/Earth but a player's stage/Mount we unto the sky/I am sick, I must die

Comments

[shaenie.livejournal.com]

I enjoyed this a lot. Thank you.

[2ndary-author.livejournal.com]

Thanks! I've had bits of it in my WIP folder forever, so I enjoyed finishing it!

[jennytork.livejournal.com]

What a good and absolutely believable but sad story.

[masterofmidgets.livejournal.com]

Ouch...excellent but so sad!

And this is a theme I'm kinda surprised the show doesn't deal more with - I mean, you've got pre-industrial societies that have been out there for 10,000 years, the Atlantis teams have to be introducing a whole host of new germs the Pegasus natives don't have any kind of immunity for, bad things should happen!

[2ndary-author.livejournal.com]

I was actually trying to remember if there are any Earth-plagues (or Earthfolk succumbing to things that are relatively benign for native Pegasians), but I haven't seen enough episodes. Maybe next season! Thanks for commenting:)

[jayel-fox.livejournal.com]

As everyone else has said, a wonderfully plausible if frightening exploration of the realities of exploration. I'm just sad the Marquetrians had to die. Makes me wonder how many other first contacts have ended the same way with no one the wiser. (Although I do have to say, Sheppard was rather stupid for bringing an unknown contagion back to the city, but it's entirely within character for him. I'd be much more in line with McKay's paranoia...)


...Earthfolk succumbing to things that are relatively benign for native Pegasians...

There's one such episode in Season Four on the SGA side of things and I'm sure they had to have dealt with it at least once in SG-1's ten years, but nothing comes to mind.

[2ndary-author.livejournal.com]

The Marquetrians are my general Pegasus-galaxy natives: they appear in a couple of stories, whenever I need non-Athosians...so they'll probably live to fight another day.

aha, season 4: I *knew* there had to be some kind of plague episode (iratus bugs don't count), but I haven't seen many of the more recent SGA eps, so thanks for that!

[dragonladyk.livejournal.com]

I think the general explanation is that there is JUST enough difference between Pegasi and Milky Way that most diseases can't jump the barrier.

The Ancients were dumb, but they were pretty smart, too.

DragonLady

[vecturist.livejournal.com]

Sniff. So plausible.

[2ndary-author.livejournal.com]

And they all died, the end. I'm just a little ray of fannish sunshine, no?

[sholio]

Ouch. Very plausible (and scary) idea; it's only a miracle that nothing like this has happened to them before! Nicely done.

(I'm awfully confused on the timeline, though. Late in the story there's a reference to the Siege and to Rodney blowing up 5/6 of a solar system in Trinity, but at the start of the story Ford is on the team; I'm not sure if I missed a time-jump to the second season somewhere?)

[2ndary-author.livejournal.com]

No, no, you're right: no time-jump, just sloppy writing;)

[sholio]

Sorry, I hope it didn't sound like I was trying to be a jerk; I can be a total dork about catching subtle clues, and I could totally believe I might've missed something somewhere! *g*

[2ndary-author.livejournal.com]

no, it's a good catch! I've only seen a handful of episodes from season 1 and 2, and I didn't really watch them in order, so my sense of sequence in Atlantis is kind of like "and then, a thing happened, and after that, something else." When I repost, maybe I'll change Ford to Ronon...or find another example of Rodney's pride overcoming his good sense.

[argosy.livejournal.com]

Aw,so sad. Nice job.

[mice1900.livejournal.com]

Ow. Now there's a story you'll never actually see on SGA -- too realistic.

[2ndary-author.livejournal.com]

I guess it would be kind of lame if they had to deal with episode after episode of serious immunological concerns, but I figured I could get away with it for one challenge;)

[xparrot.livejournal.com]

Ow. While I think the 'gates must have some sort of anti-communicative-disease protocol - it's part of the same nanite injection that facilitates language translation, doncha know! - if SGA were at all realistic, this would be a frightening and all too likely occurrence.

[loriel-eris.livejournal.com]

Oh god. I think the bit that utterly frustrates me about this, is (almost) the same bit that gets Rodney; the fact that Mulroon doesn't or can't understand the sheer magnitude of what he's done.

But yeah, I really like concept here, the taking measles (or small pox? or something? My history sucks.) to America. And god, the planet dead at the end... That's the scary part.

[ezazahaz.livejournal.com]

Really good, and really sad. I think this one's going to stick with me...

[water-soter.livejournal.com]

No use crying over spilled milk . . . but damn, one thing, one little thing like that and an entire civilization is gone. Wonderful story, very insightful and just real.

[mangst.livejournal.com]

Really well done. It started so average day and ended up life changing. The fates of many already sealed before they even knew to worry. The poem was a nice touch of history and added to the helpless feel.

[shalom]

Great job on thinking through the ramifications of illness.

[less-star.livejournal.com]

Great story (and unfortunately entirely realistic)! Thanks for sharing.