FIC: From the Depths (1/2)
Title: From the Depths
Author: Gaia (gaiaanarchy)
Rating: R (language, mostly)
Pairings: McShep, small amounts of implied McKay/OFC and Sheppard/OMC
Beta: ellex42
Spoilers: Grace Under Pressure, the Defiant One, the Siege, Epiphany, Trinity, Conversion
Summary: John is really starting to hate the ocean and the things that come out of it. Post Grace Under Pressure.
Website version here.
A/N: I was trying to get this out before 'Echoes' aired, but the forces of my family at Thanksgiving conspired against me. I knew I was going to get Jossed, and I was right, so if you've seen that episode already, uh . . . just pretend that you haven't.
FROM THE DEPTHS
By Gaia
1. Sea Foam and Sea Men
“G’day, Mate.” Erickson opened the door with his usual 200-watt smile, slightly matted hair, and absurdly optimistic aura.
John shook his head - even with the Wraith fleet just two weeks away and the rest of the scientists running around like equation-laying chickens with their heads cut off, Erickson had just pulled out the biggest joint John had ever seen and offered him a chair.
“Hey, buddy,” John actually managed to return the grin with real sincerity. Today was a good day - no impending catastrophes, no backlogged disasters, no interdepartmental wars down in the laboratories, and John’s team was on stand-down in celebration of the Great McKay escaping from the jaws of death yet again. This was all very well and good, but the real reason why John was smiling was because today he was finally, finally going to get his way.
After nearly two years of flirtatious banter and fairy-tale-worthy heroics, Rodney McKay had finally given up the ridiculous pretense of heterosexuality and kissed John, right when John was thinking that he’d have to get a neon sign imbedded into his forehead before Rodney’d pick up the signals.
And since McKay was getting unleashed from Beckett’s evil . . . well, very conscientiously evil medical clutches, John felt it was high time for he and Rodney to consummate the relationship they’d put so much time and bitching into cultivating.
“Hey, what’s got you so giddy, Johno?” Erickson asked, stepping back and letting John into his quarters as he flopped down on the bed and reached to get the lube out of the bedside cabinet.
John shrugged. “Oh, nothing.” How were you supposed to tell your fuck-buddy that you had to regretfully inform them that something way better (and a good deal more of a pain in the ass) had come along?
“It’s not nothing,” Erickson guffawed, punching John on the arm in a way he surely intended to be playful, but was actually more along the lines of painful. “I haven’t seen you grin like that since . . . well, never.”
John looked at the floor, feeling himself flush.
Erickson squinted at the expression, vaulting himself back up off the bed in an exuberant, if not particularly graceful, motion that would have made Marmaduke proud. “You finally bagged him! Congratulations, mate! I knew he’d come around one day.”
“What? Who?” John didn’t think he was that transparent, thank you very much.
Erickson rounded out today’s bruising with a large hand slapped heartily to the center of John’s back. “C’mon, Johno, you don’t have to do that ‘don’t ask’ bullcrap with the guy you’ve been buggering the past six months.”
John smiled guiltily. “Sorry. I just . . . well, I . . . we . . .” Why was he so damned bad at discussing his feelings?
“Yeah, yeah, I know how it goes. ‘You’re an awesome mate, Rick, a real good lay, loads of fun, a bloody Adonis in the sack, hate to lose ya, but you’re not the one.’”
“I wouldn’t use those words exactly, but . . . yeah.”
Another backslap. “Don’t sweat it, mate. It was fun while it lasted. Just do me one favor though?”
“Uh . . . okay?” John was hesitant only because Erickson’s last favor had been to let him use one of the docking cranes to lift a 200 pound lobster onto the northwest pier.
“Don’t worry, Johno, I promise you won’t get covered in bits of exploding crustacean this time around.”
“Good to know.”
“It’s just that I heard from that funny little Czech bloke that you were using those jumpers of yours as submersibles and you know the kinds of . . .”
“I already put you on the list for the first surveying mission.” John gave Erickson a wink. “And, hey, do you think I could borrow your extra board?”
“Gonna take him surfing?”
“No, but if he thinks that I think that he can’t surf then he’ll pout, so I have to bring it along so he can bitch about how he really can’t. Does that make sense?”
“More than astrophysics.”
John nodded. “True enough.”
“Have fun, mate!” Erikson yelled after him, leaving John with yet another jarring back pat.
He didn’t even realize he was whistling until Cadman walked past. “Good morning, Sir?” she asked with a saucy smile.
“That better not be insubordination, Lieutenant,” John joked.
“Wouldn’t dream of it. Quiet night, Sir. That’s reason enough.”
“Amen to that, Lieutenant.”
Cadman left him with a wink, before continuing on her rounds.
Gotta be more careful, he told himself, even though nothing was going to tamp down on that ridiculously giddy smile he knew he must be sporting.
Ah, just the door he was looking for. John ran a furtive hand through his hair before knocking.
“What? The city had better be on the verge of exploding or someone has finally found a Starbucks in the Pegasus Galaxy, if whoever is knocking on my door at this hour after I’ve been nearly drowned and concussed wants hot water for, oh . . . all of eternity.”
John smiled to himself, grin ready for when the door flew open. “I hear the hot springs in hell are nice this time of year.”
Rodney seemed to run out of steam seeing John standing there. “What? Oh . . . it’s you. Colonel Early Worm couldn’t possibly let me get away with an extra hour on my one, possibly only, day of disaster-free downtime?”
John grinned. “It’s early bird, and I’m here to make sure you put that one good day of disaster-free downtime to good use.” He waggled his eyebrows suggestively, settling into a comfortable sprawl on Rodney’s bed. He had a great day planned for them - surfing, a couple of beers he’d convinced Branford to smuggle on the Daedalus , some good old fashioned necking in the sand, and then collapsing onto fresh linens with a sunburn and the sunset.
“What are you grinning about?” Rodney interrupted his musings, tossing a dirty shirt in John’s direction as he searched around for his laptop. “Please tell me nothing’s exploded and the city’s monthly Jell-o supply is still intact.”
John’s grin widened as he allowed himself to stretch fully, shirt riding up past his naval.
“What are you doing? You look like my cat. Did you come here for any particular reason, Colonel, or are you just going to mark my pillow and meow until I scratch behind your ears?”
Okay, so maybe Rodney needed a little prodding. It was just like the man to not see a returned interest when it was jumping up and down, uncomfortably tight jeans and all. John rolled his eyes, adjusting himself. “Well, there are some things you could scratch.”
“Hm?” Rodney asked, tearing into, then out of, the bathroom. “Have you seen my laptop? I swear it was just . . . ah . . .”
John sighed, standing. Time to switch gears. He crept up to where Rodney was bent over, using his sexiest slink, and leaned over until his breath was tickling the back of Rodney’s neck.
Only to have Rodney jerk up in surprise, landing a good head-butt to John’s nose.
“Jesus, McKay, got that thing plated in bullet-proof armor?”
“Well, what the hell were you doing getting so friendly? Personal space, Colonel, I’m sure you’re familiar with the concept. And . . . wait . . . do you think that would actually work, because my brain is pretty valuable commodity and losing it to a pesky little thing like a bullet . . .”
“No, Rodney, it would not work, and after what happened yesterday I thought you wouldn’t care how friendly . . .”
“What?” Rodney’s eyes went wide before he buried his face in his hands. “Oh, yesterday. Um . . . about that, Colonel, whatever I might’ve done . . . said . . . I had a concussion. She was just a figment of my imagination. I knew you’d come for me. A part of me did, I swear . . . and did I mention, thanks for that?” Rodney punctuated his statement with an awkward grip on John’s arm. “Seriously, thanks.”
What the hell? That wasn’t what he was talking about. Not at all. “Um, don’t mention it. Look, Rodney, do you . . . when you . . .” God, he was so bad at this. “About what you did in the jumper, on the ride back . . . wait, who’s she?” John fought the sudden stab of jealousy deep in his gut.
“Oh . . . you know . . . nobody. Hallucination. I mean, of course she wasn’t . . . I was just a little . . . you know, concussed.” Rodney flushed.
Oh shit. “So you don’t . . . you didn’t . . . wait . . . what?”
“Okay, you have to promise not to tell anybody,” Rodney looked either way, whispering as though he expected to find someone else hiding in a corner of his small little closet of a room. “But I . . . uh . . . I hallucinated that Lieutenant Colonel Carter was there in the jumper with me. And she kept telling me that you were coming for me and I shouldn’t waste my energy and that I had no chance with her, but then I actually did and . . . well, you don’t want to hear about that, do you? Anyway, to what do I owe the displeasure of you bounding in here at ungodly hours of the morning?”
Houston, we have a problem. Rodney had been hallucinating . . . hallucinating about Colonel Carter, not John. Trying not to let his disappointment show, John ground out, “Oh, nothing, I just thought you might want to spend the day on the beach. Surf a little, sun a little, relax.”
Rodney rolled his eyes. “Yes, because drowning and skin cancer are my two favorite leisurely past-times.”
“C’mon, McKay, it’ll be fun,” John pleaded half-heartedly. “All piña coladas and hula girls.”
“Hula girls? Really?”
“No. But you could always ask Teyla . . .”
“Yeah, sorry, Colonel, but I’m actually very attached to my balls, and with those big sticks of hers . . .”
“We can teach Ronon how to surf.”
“Yes, yes, and it’ll be just like Baywatch, only without the driving force of Pamela Anderson’s spectacular breasts. Emmmm . . . do you think maybe if it’s not a hula skirt we could get Teyla to . . .”
“Maybe she’ll be so grateful you’re still alive that she’ll let you keep on living. But I wouldn’t count on it.” Could they please stop talking about all the gorgeous babes that Rodney’d rather chase futilely around than the guy waiting patiently right before his eyes? Seriously, did he really think he could find someone better for him? Someone who’d put up with his bitching and play Starcraft with him and keep him from blowing himself up?
Rodney shrugged. “Well, I guess it’s been a while since we had a team day.”
Rodney was getting that look - the one where here was secretly excited but too proud to show it. On any other day it would have made John grin, but today he just clapped Rodney on the shoulder and said, “Cool. Meet us in the Jumper Bay in twenty.” He’d planned on dragging Rodney there, without even a stop for the SPF1000, but now he had to radio Ronon and Teyla and dredge up two more surfboards. A few more of Erickson’s marine biology buddies must have them.
John ambled off, trying not to cringe at the bitter finality of the door sliding closed behind him.
2. Beware the Undertow
John was glaring at Ronon. Well, he was trying to glare while pretending to just be squinting at the unnatural brightness of Atlantis’ sun. Sometimes it was great to have someone as terrifyingly physical as Ronon on your team, like, oh say, when you were getting chased around by scary aliens with pulse rifles or needed to interrogate the gibbering idiot of the week, or even when you wanted the last bear-claw at the mess. But it sure as hell sucked when you were trying to show off your manly surfing skills to Mr. Oblivious himself.
“Sheppard, come here, you’re going to look like my mother’s attempt at meat loaf if you don’t put on some sunscreen . . . the woman did not know the meaning of well done. I doubt she even knew edible. That certainly explains my love of airplane food. Anyhow, do you have any idea about the ozone levels of this planet?”
John shook his hair in that way that always seemed to look so good in the movies. Keanu Reeves in Point Break . . . take that.
Rodney just snapped his fingers. “Wasting time. Every second another one of your cells goes melanomic.”
“Really?” Because that would actually really suck.
“I don’t know, do I look like I practice voodoo? Look, your lifetime exposure to radiation is probably even worse than mine, now, please, come here.”
John made a big show of rolling his eyes, but it was actually kind of sweet that Rodney was so concerned about him. He plopped down right on Rodney’s blanket, exposing his back to the man.
“Fine, make me do all the work,” Rodney grumbled. Teyla looked up from where she appeared to be napping to give him an incredulous look. Damn women and their stupid little womany psychic skills. But it was worth it - Rodney’s skilled hands running up and down his back, too firm to be a caress, but with more than enough care to show his concern. John smiled, ordering himself not to get hard, damnit.
“What about him?” John asked, trying not to moan as Rodney’s hands ran down his biceps, tickling the hairs on his arms.
“Hm?”
“Mr. Universe.” John nodded towards where Ronon was in the middle of doing an actual headstand while on the goddamned board. Do not look at his abs, John told himself, pointlessly. In this case, resistance really was futile.
“He’s a big boy. He can take care of himself.”
John spun around. “And that makes me . . .”
“A petulant five year old that needs childproofing to keep him from strapping himself to a nuclear warhead and kamikaze-ing his skinny ass every chance he gets. Seriously, trying to keep you alive is harder than multi-variable spatial dynamics . . . not that it’s particularly difficult once you . . .”
“I . . .”
“I think what Dr. McKay means to say is ‘thank you, Colonel Sheppard, for saving my life,’” Teyla said with a yawn, rolling over to tan her stomach. Rodney’s hands stilled on John’s back. Teyla did look absolutely fantastic in a bikini, but seriously, that was no excuse. John glared.
“So . . . um . . . yes, what she said . . .” Rodney mumbled incoherently, a big blob of sunscreen squirted haphazardly between John’s shoulders.
“Well, as fun as this was . . .” Not. “I think I’d better be heading back out. Gotta teach Ronon how to hang ten.”
“Wait, at least let me finish . . .” Rodney’s voice trailed off into the sound of the surf as John snagged his board and dove in.
Thankfully, it was hard to stay angry with the wind in your hair and the sun on your face and a really fucking big wave . . . shit.
John was under before he could even utter the word out loud, tumbling head over heels beneath the surf, blinded by salt and sand and motion. He came up spluttering, disoriented, and gack, was it just him or was this ocean actually saltier than Earth?
But hey, fingers, toes . . . check, and check. He’d catch up on the rest later. Also, where was his board? John tried vainly to get his feet on the ground, but it seemed as though he’d somehow gotten swept . . . well, this wasn’t good.
He was heading around the point and further away from the jumper and their little camp by the second. Damned rip tide. Fuck the board. He could use the GPS beacon Rodney’d installed to snatch it with the jumper later. Feeling the stretch in his shoulders (God, was he going to be sore later) he swam toward shore, making marginal headway even as the point flew by. But the going was tough, and he must have pulled something because ow.
But his instincts kicked in and before he knew it, he was stumbling to shore, limp and exhausted, but still alive. He wanted to just collapse there in the surf, but then . . . movement. John forced himself to his feet and into a defensive stance, staggering forward to peak that the glimpse of movement beyond the rock just up the shoreline.
“Hello?” he asked. He really hoped that whatever it was happened to be friendly, because he was seriously hurting, and now really wasn’t a good time.
There was a sort of choked screech, and some scrambling and then, before he knew it, he was staring into wide sea-blue eyes. The woman had long auburn hair, wet and clinging to small breasts, leaving the rest pretty much open to speculation.
John cleared his throat, immediately focusing his attention above the neck. Why did this always happen to him? “Um . . . hi . . . I’m Lieutenant Colonel John Sheppard. And you might be?”
The women opened full pink lips and . . . emitted the most horrible screeching noise John had ever heard. It was rude to cover his ears, so he just winced, trying not to remember his demolitions training and all the lectures about protecting your hearing.
“Okay, okay, calm down,” he said, even though she didn’t seem all that threatened. If anything, she looked disappointed, eyes roaming casually over his body. Hey, he worked out, there shouldn’t be anything to complain about. He looked down to check on his abs. He was having trouble managing his belly these days, though he blamed it all on those damned tava beans.
Finished with her inspection, the woman . . . no, girl - she couldn’t be more than sixteen . . . stepped closer, motioning strangely with her hands, pointing to her eyes. And . . . was she trying to mime an airplane? Damn, John was terrible at charades.
“Can I . . . um . . . help you?” John asked. It wasn’t like he routinely ran into mute naked girls on alien beaches or anything. He was feeling a little out of his element here.
The girl made another screech, pointing towards the water.
“Um . . . okay, well, how about you just sit tight and . . .” he wasn’t wearing his jacket, so he didn’t know how to solve this whole nudity thing. Maybe they could just walk back to camp and then figure out where in the hell she came from. The mainland was supposed to be uninhabited, goddamnit.
Then, suddenly, Teyla came barreling around the bend, bouncing just like something straight out of Baywatch. So maybe Rodney was right, after all. “Colonel, thanks to Ancestors you are uninjured. When we saw you ‘wipe out’ we feared for the worst.”
Teyla paused, seeing the girl and took a step back, body taut and fighting-ready. “Who is this?”
“Don’t worry, I don’t think she’s dangerous,” John answered the unasked question.
“That is fortunate. This sun bath wear of yours does not come with a place for the concealment of weapons.”
“That’s okay, I got it.”
John spun around, seeing Ronon dragging his board out of the water, pulling a knife from his hair. He surfed with those? Was he trying to lobotomize himself?
“Hi,” John said.
Ronon grunted, looking suspiciously at the girl. She stared back at him curiously, not threatened in the slightest.
“Where’d you get her?” Ronon asked.
The girl’s face fell.
“I have no idea,” John sighed, letting the tension flow out of him. His team was here now. They’d figure something out. Well, at least they would when Rodney . . .
The sand fluttered up in their faces, causing everyone but Ronon to cover their eyes and squint about. A muffled crash and a large spurt of sand seemed to mark the landing of a puddlejumper.
“McKay,” Ronon remarked, knife still out, as Rodney stepped out from the cloaked jumper. “Why’s it invisible?”
Rodney looked back, confused. “Oh, well, I must have been thinking about danger, seeing as Colonel hair-spray-for-brains has decided that he hasn’t filled his manly-heroics quota for the month and . . .” Rodney turned back around, noticing the startlingly nude addition to their party. “Oh, great!” He threw up his hands in the air. “I don’t know how he does it. Sheppard does something stupid and naked women materialize out of thin air. What kind of incentives system is the universe trying to provide anyhow? Almost die of your own stupidity and bimbos fall from the sky; save the day through wit and courage and god-like intelligence and you get what? Pneumonia and hallucinations?” Rodney addressed the sky. “How is that fair?”
John scowled. Of course Rodney would go there. As though John wanted women throwing themselves at him left and right. All he asked for was the ability to fly and a nice fat cock to fuck himself on, but only in a cruel universe like this one would those things be mutually exclusive.
“And of course, you just love risking . . .” Before he knew it, Rodney was darting forward so fast that John twitched, gasping and holding his hand to the muscles he must have pulled in his neck. “Are you okay?” Rodney continued. “Do we need to get a stretcher? Oh my god, you’ve broken your neck, you . . .”
“I’m fine, McKay,” John sighed. Right now all he wanted was an icepack and a nice long nap.
“Are you sure, because . . .”
A loud screeching noise interrupted the usual Rodney-projected-hypochondriac panic-attack.
“What the hell is that noise? I need my ears, for all that useless hearing I do. I mean, not that it normally pays to listen to the things these idiots have to say, but on principle . . .”
He trailed off, making John spin around, despite the sharp twinge of pain in his neck. Of course, his day could always get worse - the girl was staring at Rodney with this look of naked adoration on her face. Just exactly what John didn’t need right now.
Before John could say anything, or Ronon could throw any of his varied concealed armaments, the girl was darting forward, pressing her perfect perky little breasts up into Rodney chest and burying her face in his neck.
“Um . . . er . . . hi . . . I . . . you . . . ah . . . you must be cold,” Rodney spluttered, patting her awkwardly on the back.
“I think she likes you, McKay,” Ronon remarked with a grin.
“It is quite apparent to us all, Ronon,” Teyla affirmed.
“Yes, yes, well, I could see . . .” Rodney mumbled, pulling off his shirt to reveal blinding whiteness underneath. Of course he would have just the right amount of hair sprinkled lightly across his chest, and the pink peaked nipples that had already been the focus of many of John’s fantasies.
But instead of hanging around, letting John enjoy the view, he helped the girl pull on the shirt, yanking when the synthetic clung to her wet body like a fucking second skin, then putting his arm around her and leading her toward the jumper.
Ronon raised an eyebrow at John, then followed vigilantly, leaving John standing there dumbfounded and a little hurt. Wasn’t it always Rodney that wrapped his arm around John’s waist and helped him out of a tight spot?
“Are you all right, John?” Teyla asked, moving to his side to guide him gently back towards their craft.
“No,” he whispered, but his response was drowned out by Rodney declaring that the girl wouldn’t let go of him, so John would have to drive.
More than just his neck twinged when John settled himself in the pilot’s seat.
<<<>>>
John sighed, palming the icepack Beckett had given him and slowly lowering himself down to his bed. He was stiff now, but it’d be worse tomorrow. He couldn’t believe there was a time of his life when he’d done this pretty much every day for an entire summer. He didn’t remember aches and pains like this.
And Carson was being stingy with the aspirin again. John couldn’t decide whether or not it was due to preoccupation with the medical miracle that was their newest visitor or just the fact that Carson hated when John hurt himself ‘unnecessarily.’ God, it wasn’t as though he liked being so sore that he could barely move.
It was just another frustration to add to the pile - Elizabeth’s scowl, the sunburn on his nose, Rodney’s rejection, and that . . . girl, curling around Rodney like he was her own personal scratching post.
And she was in perfect health, except overexertion and inability to produce any sort of meaningful sound. But did Rodney scan her under the table? Did he snub her and go behind John’s back to try to send her away like he had with Chaya? Of course not. John wasn’t allowed to get Rodney and he certainly wasn’t allowed to get the girl, but Rodney? Rodney could do anything his desperate little heart desired, including treading all over John’s. And he expected John to just stand there and . . .
“Hey,” the door to John’s quarters slide upon, revealing Rodney standing there, shoulders slumped.
“Hey,” John tried to push himself up, but his neck protested and he slid back down.
“Oh, no, just stay there, its okay. Nothing urgent. Here, let me get you some water. I brought you some more aspirin. I’ve got a stash. The labmonkeys have to fork over a pill every time they make a life-endangering mistake. It’d sicken you to know how much I’ve got stored up.”
“So you don’t just make them cry or cower in terror, you extort them for drugs as well.”
“Yep, pretty much. Look, I’m sorry I came by so late. It’s just she . . . I don’t know, the girl. She wouldn’t let go of me, and she almost cried every time I tried to leave her. I couldn’t . . . . She’s asleep though. Carson says her body’s been through some sort of system-wide trauma recently. I suppose it has something to do with how she got here. Nobody can figure out that screeching noise.”
“Thanks for the update,” John mumbled. But then Rodney placed two white tablets in his hand. “And the aspirin.”
“You’re welcome.” Rodney handed him a glass of water, then took it away after he swallowed. “Are you sure you’re okay? I heard Carson say something about strains . . . granted she was crying then so I couldn’t really hear, but he said you might have to . . .”
“It’s not as bad as last time.” They’d both try not to remember that one, after Gall and Abrams, that pesky neck brace. “You only get to see me in a collar for a day or so.”
“Oh,” Rodney said, sitting down on the bed at John’s waist. The heat suffused against his side felt good. “Well, a collar would only be good for you if it came along with a leash.”
John choked out a chuckle. “Very funny . . . ow.” Laughing was too much movement for now.
“Here,” Rodney said, “Let me.” And then there were warm fingers dancing down his spine, circling, kneading the hard little pebbles of muscle away. John moaned, drifting slowly off to sleep.
His last thought was that it always had to be like this - so close he could feel it, yet so far away. He only vaguely remembered Rodney leaving, warm hands patting his back, “feel better, Colonel.”
Always Colonel, never John.
<<<>>>
Of course, if John thought that the whole massage thing made them closer, he was most definitely wrong. After that, Rodney was never seen out of sight of that . . . that girl. She was young, sure, and maybe Rodney wasn’t too much of a pedophile type, but there was only so much adoration and groping a straight guy could take before he submitted and let the little slut seduce him. John knew. He’d been jailbait himself back in the day.
John rolled his eyes as they entered the mess, feeling Teyla kick him lightly beneath the table. “You should be proud of Rodney. He is at least making an effort to take care of our guest.” Of course Teyla would also be taken by her. Underneath all that strong warrior-woman stuff, Teyla really did just have a goddamned bleeding heart.
John snorted into his cornflakes.
“I understand you are jealous of her friendship with Dr. McKay, but that is no reason . . .”
“Friendship? Is that what your people call it?” It was Ronon’s turn to receive a kick under the table.
“Ronon, you should be ashamed of yourself. It is not Rodney’s way to take advantage of . . .”
Rodney strolled over, a bright smile on his face. John gave his scrambled eggs a vicious poke. He hadn’t seen Rodney this happy since the chefs figured out how to turn Sip’al fruit into jelly doughnuts. “I was just showing our guest here how to modulate the shielding frequencies. She has quite a knack for it you, know. I think I might just go ahead and let her have the job. It’ll allow me to demote Kavanagh to cappuccino-girl duty like I always wanted to. We’ll have to find him a hair net, though.”
“You know, she probably has a name, McKay,” Ronon remarked, spraying a few spare pieces of scrambled eggs when he spoke. John brushed them off his tray, used to it by now.
“Yes, yes, unfortunately she can’t actually say it, now can she. Carson said something about brain waves and language function and blah, blah, blah. She understands just fine. Besides, I always wanted a woman who could hold her tongue.”
That got Rodney a kick under the table. “What? I didn’t say all women should be seen not heard!” Another kick. “Teyla! This has nothing to do with you. Seriously, I’m all for feminists . . . er . . . girlpower . . . um, bra burning . . .”
John rolled his eyes.
“Maybe we can name her. I always liked Marie, but would that be too cliché . . .”
“You will not name her as you would a pet, Rodney!” Teyla was starting to do that mothering thing again. John scooted his shins out of striking distance, just in case.
“And besides, Marie?” Since when was Rodney classy enough to pull off a French girlfriend?
“Maybe we can guess,” Ronon offered.
The girl nodded at him, enthusiastically.
“Bertha,” John suggested.
“Oh, please. She’s much too . . . ah . . . er . . . well, she’s very um . . . intelligent. Beautiful . . . she’s not a Bertha.”
Rodney smiled at the girl. She smiled back. Her teeth were perfect. It made John want to puke.
“Well, how about, Mildred?”
“She looks like a Restalari to me,” Ronon said, between bites of jelly doughnut.
“Or perhaps an Ary’l,” Teyla put in.
“Good one,” Ronon approved.
Huh. Different galaxy, almost infinite combination of names. This was going to be difficult.
Coming to the same conclusion, Rodney frowned, but he soon brightened. “Well, I guess this just means that I’ll have to teach you how to write.”
“In the meantime, why don’t we just call her . . .”
“Ary’l sounds good to me,” Ronon declared. And nobody disagreed with Ronon when he declared.
Ary’l seemed pleased. John, on the other hand, was not.
“Oh, that’s a good girl,” Rodney praised. “Look, unlike some mouth-breathing barbarians, she knows how to use a fork now.”
John rolled his eyes. The first time she’d seen it, she’d try to use the thing to brush her hair. How smart could she really be? She probably couldn’t get into Mensa.
3. What Triton Wants, Triton Gets
If John had thought it was bad before, it was worse now that they’d started up on missions again. He barely saw Rodney anymore, and when he did, Ary’l was always trailing after him like a little lost puppy dog or something. And instead of kicking her, the way he seemed to do with all helpless labtechs and people who got underfoot in general, he seemed to actually enjoy the attention. God, John didn’t even know desperate was Rodney’s type.
And when they went out on missions, she’d huddle up next to Elizabeth in the Gateroom, eyes watery and pathetic. The first two times, she’d whined so high-pitched and screechy that John was afraid she’d break the glass of Elizabeth’s office walls.
“I hear she sleeps in his bedroom,” Cadman said, breaking John out of his stupor. “I mean, I would’ve figured McKay for a little kinky. Beyond all that babbling awkwardness there’s got to be some sort of seriously repressed animal, you know?”
John didn’t know. That was sort of the point.
“But I guess I can’t blame him. If someone looked at me like that, I’m not sure I could say no,” Cadman continued, casually reaching around to fix one of the buckles on John’s pack. Was he really getting that careless?
“How does she look at him?” John mumbled, though he wasn’t quite sure why. It was obvious.
“Like he’s the whole reason for her existence. I mean, screw the laws, right? Carson says he can’t even determine her exact age anyway. She’s old enough to fall in love with him.”
“Yeah, well, I guess we’ll just have to wait and see what Rodney’s decided.”
Cadman smirked at that, giving her weapon one last check before heading out the door. “I know what he’s decided. Came and asked me for advice last night. I’ve got them set up for a romantic dinner up in the observatory tonight. Stars floating above their heads, a warm sea breeze, French wine and a home cooked meal - and she doesn’t even seem to mind if Rodney talks too much, so really, what could go wrong?”
“Tonight?” John asked, barely conscious of Elizabeth’s usual farewell salutation before he stepped through the gate. Rodney planned a romantic dinner for the day John was going off with Cadman’s team to check out a possible beta site?
“That’s what I said,” Cadman answered. “How will he ever pull it off without me?”
Then there was a flash of light, and it all went black.
<<<>>>
The next thing John knew, someone was slapping his face. Hard, too.
“Hey,” John gasped. “Stop that.” He had a mother of a headache, and things felt off enough as it was. Was all the hitting really necessary?
“Thank god, Sir.” It was Harris’ voice. Good ‘ole Harris, never missed the southern accent. “Are you okay to move?”
It was dark. When did it get dark? And John felt sort of dizzy - nauseous. What was going on? “Report?” John asked.
“Some sort of ambush, Sir. Stun grenades. Not energy-based like the Wraith ones. Good old flash bangs, with a lot more oomph. You got the most exposure. Look, we’re in a defensible position right now, but we have to move.”
God, John was dizzy and it was really dark. He tried to struggle up, but how was he supposed to find his bearings like this?
“Cadman?”
“We split up. She and Schwartz are in a cave about a three clicks from here. The plan is to sit tight and wait for backup to come through the next time Dr. Weir opens the gate and we can signal her.”
“Good plan,” John muttered, massaging his temples. “Why’s it so dark in here?”
“Oh, um . . . Sir . . . it’s not. You’re just experiencing a side effect of the stun grenade. My vision was off for an hour or so, but I can see fine now.”
“An hour? How long’ve I been out?”
“Two and a half, Sir. You hit your head when you fell. Been in and out of it for a while. Said some pretty weird things.”
“Like what?” John really wished he could see Harris’ face right now. He needed to read whether or not there was going to be a serious problem with this.
“Well, I don’t want to ask and you don’t have to tell, but in my humble opinion, Sir, you should just go for it.”
“Go for what?” And since when did Baptist Marines from Georgia give big fat gay love advice anyhow? Wasn’t this the part where John got the shit beat out of him?
“You know, that whole hard-on you’ve got for . . .”
“Harris?” John heard Cadman’s voice drifting over a nearby radio and suddenly remembered to panic about this whole temporary blindness deal. Where was Rodney? He had to find Rodney . . .
“Here, Ma’am.”
“I’ve got backup coming in. Just hang tight, okay?”
“Yeah, tight . . .” John slurred, before losing consciousness again.
<<<>>>
When John woke up, Rodney wasn’t there. He was in the infirmary, if that really mattered. Everything was blurry, bright white blobs floating in and out of his vision.
Carson said that everything was fine, that the shock would wear off on its own. Except John knew it wouldn’t. Where the hell was Rodney?
Had she kidnapped him? Maybe this was like the thing with Chaya, only she was - you know, evil. And . . . yes, evil. Redheads, immediately in love with Rodney McKay, high screechy voice - incontrovertible signs of pure unadulterated badness.
John lurched to his feet, yanking out the IV without even a second thought. It was, of course, not the first time he’d done that. Now, where did Cadman say? Oh, yes, the observatory. And that was . . . where, exactly?
John stumbled out the infirmary doors and down the corridor. It was frighteningly easy. Carson was just too damned trusting. John grinned a bit at that, stumbling into the nearest transporter. Where was he going again?
Oh, yes, Rodney, evil girl, observatory. Candles. Was there a fire hazard? Was he even in charge of fire hazards? He could have sworn he’d delegated that one.
John practically fell out of the transporter and into . . . hey . . . they were getting a little friendly there. Not good, leaning in like that. If Rodney wasn’t careful, he might lead the girl on. Or maybe catch her hair on fire.
“That’s dangerous,” John said. It was kinda dark in here. His vision was blurry.
“Sheppard?” Rodney asked, incredulous. “What are you . . . oh, my god, is there a Wraith attack? Is the city sinking?” He tapped on his earpiece. “Hello, Chuck . . . Gateroom guy . . . eh . . . did you try rerouting power from the secondary generation capacitors . . . what do you mean ‘your name’s not Chuck?’ Chuck, this is no time for a thing like this . . . ‘what thing like this?’ Chuck, I’ve got Sheppard here, white as a sheet, interrupting what would otherwise be a spectacular date and . . .”
Rodney narrowed his eyes and stood abruptly, dragging a little bit of the tablecloth with him, before rushing to John’s side. “What’re you doing here? Are you okay?”
John considered that for a moment. He was feeling a little off. For one, the floor looked a little further away than he was used to. And it was pretty dark in here. Then he remembered pervasive darkness, Harris’ soft southern accent and the fear . . . “I was afraid,” he said. “You weren’t there.”
In the background, the girl looked on impatiently. John scowled at her. She shouldn’t even be on a date with Rodney anyhow. It was past her bedtime.
“John?” Rodney whispered. His grip was warm on John’s arm.
John blinked, and then somehow he was laying on the ground, his head resting on Rodney’s lap, panicked babble rushing by above him.
“Rodney?”
“Oh, good. Carson’s on his way. You just . . . you stay there. What happened anyhow?”
“Mission went south.” John winced. His head was starting to pound again. “Concussion.”
Rodney sighed, his fingers trailing lazily through John’s hair. John smiled. This was the life.
<<<>>>
“Not so fast, Colonel. I’m not quite done with ya yet,” Carson said. He didn’t even look up from the chart he was looking at, the bastard.
John groaned. He was tired (even though he’d spent the last day or so pretty much sleeping). And his head still hurt. All he wanted was to get back to his own quarters and curl up for a nice long nap.
“Groan all you want, but you’re staying,” Carson chided. “You know I don’t enjoy you when you’re bored and grumpy anymore than you do, but believe me, I’m doing this for your own good.”
John hung his head shame-facedly. “Sorry, doc. I just want to get out of here before uh . . . Rodney comes back.”
Carson nodded. “Aye, I can sympathize, Colonel. I do not envy you listening to that . . . er . . . noise, with a headache like I’m sure you’re sporting.”
“Why does she do that anyhow?”
“As far as I can tell, there’s nothing wrong with the way that she interprets sound - almost as though she already understood our language - suggests she’d been through the gate, it does. But when we took cerebral scans we found that the speech centers of her brain were configured quite differently. It’s not that she can’t make noise, but that she doesn’t seem to understand how to control vocal cords.” He shrugged. “Can’t for the life of me figure out why.”
“And you don’t think that’s, um . . . sinister?”
Carson laughed, fingers finding John’s pulse. “Hardly, Colonel. She’s a dear, that one. Poor thing must have gone through some sort of trauma. That’s the best I can come up with. Gets a wee bit screechy when she’s upset, but I cannot even be sure it’s conscious. Could be a form of retardation, though from what Rodney tells me, she’s a bit of a savant. He’s taught her all sorts of things. She’s very good with harmonics, apparently.”
John scowled. Rodney used to teach him things. “But why does she always have to screech so much around me?” He knew he was whining, but he’d had the mother of all migraines; high-pitched choking was probably the last thing he needed.
“I think it’s perfectly obvious, Colonel. For some completely unfathomable reason she’s attached herself to Rodney.”
“No kidding,” John mumbled, sighing theatrically when Carson shone the goddamned penlight in his eyes for the five bazillionth time in the past two days.
“She’s jealous of the attention he gives you. Honestly, the times he’s brought her in here on her own she’s been quiet as a mouse. I showed her the gene sequencing software - kept her occupied for hours.”
“Yeah, well, she needs to get used to Rodney spending time with other people. I need him back on my team.”
Carson sighed. “Aye. You know, I think she’d feel a wee bit more secure if he’d just . . . erm . . . accept what she’s offering.” Carson blushed. Thank god the man didn’t go into gynecology. John suddenly felt very very sorry for the poor Athosian women Carson saw on the mainland.
“You don’t think she’s a little young for him, Doc?”
Carson shrugged. “To tell ya the truth, we have no real way of knowing exactly how old she is. Wear and tear, diseases, dental health, things we normally use as indicators of age are all as perfect as a newborn babe. She’s most likely younger than him, but clearly old enough to make her own decisions. I don’t begrudge her the opportunity. And Rodney either, for that fact. He’s been under too much stress recently. And that whole debacle with Katie. He could use someone to take good care of him.”
Yes, and that someone could be John. Couldn’t it? Why not? “I guess.”
“It upsetting you that he’s the one to get the girl this time?”
“No,” John said, with hesitation. It bothered him that this time, the girl might get Rodney.
ON TO PART TWO
Author: Gaia (gaiaanarchy)
Rating: R (language, mostly)
Pairings: McShep, small amounts of implied McKay/OFC and Sheppard/OMC
Beta: ellex42
Spoilers: Grace Under Pressure, the Defiant One, the Siege, Epiphany, Trinity, Conversion
Summary: John is really starting to hate the ocean and the things that come out of it. Post Grace Under Pressure.
Website version here.
A/N: I was trying to get this out before 'Echoes' aired, but the forces of my family at Thanksgiving conspired against me. I knew I was going to get Jossed, and I was right, so if you've seen that episode already, uh . . . just pretend that you haven't.
FROM THE DEPTHS
By Gaia
1. Sea Foam and Sea Men
“G’day, Mate.” Erickson opened the door with his usual 200-watt smile, slightly matted hair, and absurdly optimistic aura.
John shook his head - even with the Wraith fleet just two weeks away and the rest of the scientists running around like equation-laying chickens with their heads cut off, Erickson had just pulled out the biggest joint John had ever seen and offered him a chair.
“Hey, buddy,” John actually managed to return the grin with real sincerity. Today was a good day - no impending catastrophes, no backlogged disasters, no interdepartmental wars down in the laboratories, and John’s team was on stand-down in celebration of the Great McKay escaping from the jaws of death yet again. This was all very well and good, but the real reason why John was smiling was because today he was finally, finally going to get his way.
After nearly two years of flirtatious banter and fairy-tale-worthy heroics, Rodney McKay had finally given up the ridiculous pretense of heterosexuality and kissed John, right when John was thinking that he’d have to get a neon sign imbedded into his forehead before Rodney’d pick up the signals.
And since McKay was getting unleashed from Beckett’s evil . . . well, very conscientiously evil medical clutches, John felt it was high time for he and Rodney to consummate the relationship they’d put so much time and bitching into cultivating.
“Hey, what’s got you so giddy, Johno?” Erickson asked, stepping back and letting John into his quarters as he flopped down on the bed and reached to get the lube out of the bedside cabinet.
John shrugged. “Oh, nothing.” How were you supposed to tell your fuck-buddy that you had to regretfully inform them that something way better (and a good deal more of a pain in the ass) had come along?
“It’s not nothing,” Erickson guffawed, punching John on the arm in a way he surely intended to be playful, but was actually more along the lines of painful. “I haven’t seen you grin like that since . . . well, never.”
John looked at the floor, feeling himself flush.
Erickson squinted at the expression, vaulting himself back up off the bed in an exuberant, if not particularly graceful, motion that would have made Marmaduke proud. “You finally bagged him! Congratulations, mate! I knew he’d come around one day.”
“What? Who?” John didn’t think he was that transparent, thank you very much.
Erickson rounded out today’s bruising with a large hand slapped heartily to the center of John’s back. “C’mon, Johno, you don’t have to do that ‘don’t ask’ bullcrap with the guy you’ve been buggering the past six months.”
John smiled guiltily. “Sorry. I just . . . well, I . . . we . . .” Why was he so damned bad at discussing his feelings?
“Yeah, yeah, I know how it goes. ‘You’re an awesome mate, Rick, a real good lay, loads of fun, a bloody Adonis in the sack, hate to lose ya, but you’re not the one.’”
“I wouldn’t use those words exactly, but . . . yeah.”
Another backslap. “Don’t sweat it, mate. It was fun while it lasted. Just do me one favor though?”
“Uh . . . okay?” John was hesitant only because Erickson’s last favor had been to let him use one of the docking cranes to lift a 200 pound lobster onto the northwest pier.
“Don’t worry, Johno, I promise you won’t get covered in bits of exploding crustacean this time around.”
“Good to know.”
“It’s just that I heard from that funny little Czech bloke that you were using those jumpers of yours as submersibles and you know the kinds of . . .”
“I already put you on the list for the first surveying mission.” John gave Erickson a wink. “And, hey, do you think I could borrow your extra board?”
“Gonna take him surfing?”
“No, but if he thinks that I think that he can’t surf then he’ll pout, so I have to bring it along so he can bitch about how he really can’t. Does that make sense?”
“More than astrophysics.”
John nodded. “True enough.”
“Have fun, mate!” Erikson yelled after him, leaving John with yet another jarring back pat.
He didn’t even realize he was whistling until Cadman walked past. “Good morning, Sir?” she asked with a saucy smile.
“That better not be insubordination, Lieutenant,” John joked.
“Wouldn’t dream of it. Quiet night, Sir. That’s reason enough.”
“Amen to that, Lieutenant.”
Cadman left him with a wink, before continuing on her rounds.
Gotta be more careful, he told himself, even though nothing was going to tamp down on that ridiculously giddy smile he knew he must be sporting.
Ah, just the door he was looking for. John ran a furtive hand through his hair before knocking.
“What? The city had better be on the verge of exploding or someone has finally found a Starbucks in the Pegasus Galaxy, if whoever is knocking on my door at this hour after I’ve been nearly drowned and concussed wants hot water for, oh . . . all of eternity.”
John smiled to himself, grin ready for when the door flew open. “I hear the hot springs in hell are nice this time of year.”
Rodney seemed to run out of steam seeing John standing there. “What? Oh . . . it’s you. Colonel Early Worm couldn’t possibly let me get away with an extra hour on my one, possibly only, day of disaster-free downtime?”
John grinned. “It’s early bird, and I’m here to make sure you put that one good day of disaster-free downtime to good use.” He waggled his eyebrows suggestively, settling into a comfortable sprawl on Rodney’s bed. He had a great day planned for them - surfing, a couple of beers he’d convinced Branford to smuggle on the Daedalus , some good old fashioned necking in the sand, and then collapsing onto fresh linens with a sunburn and the sunset.
“What are you grinning about?” Rodney interrupted his musings, tossing a dirty shirt in John’s direction as he searched around for his laptop. “Please tell me nothing’s exploded and the city’s monthly Jell-o supply is still intact.”
John’s grin widened as he allowed himself to stretch fully, shirt riding up past his naval.
“What are you doing? You look like my cat. Did you come here for any particular reason, Colonel, or are you just going to mark my pillow and meow until I scratch behind your ears?”
Okay, so maybe Rodney needed a little prodding. It was just like the man to not see a returned interest when it was jumping up and down, uncomfortably tight jeans and all. John rolled his eyes, adjusting himself. “Well, there are some things you could scratch.”
“Hm?” Rodney asked, tearing into, then out of, the bathroom. “Have you seen my laptop? I swear it was just . . . ah . . .”
John sighed, standing. Time to switch gears. He crept up to where Rodney was bent over, using his sexiest slink, and leaned over until his breath was tickling the back of Rodney’s neck.
Only to have Rodney jerk up in surprise, landing a good head-butt to John’s nose.
“Jesus, McKay, got that thing plated in bullet-proof armor?”
“Well, what the hell were you doing getting so friendly? Personal space, Colonel, I’m sure you’re familiar with the concept. And . . . wait . . . do you think that would actually work, because my brain is pretty valuable commodity and losing it to a pesky little thing like a bullet . . .”
“No, Rodney, it would not work, and after what happened yesterday I thought you wouldn’t care how friendly . . .”
“What?” Rodney’s eyes went wide before he buried his face in his hands. “Oh, yesterday. Um . . . about that, Colonel, whatever I might’ve done . . . said . . . I had a concussion. She was just a figment of my imagination. I knew you’d come for me. A part of me did, I swear . . . and did I mention, thanks for that?” Rodney punctuated his statement with an awkward grip on John’s arm. “Seriously, thanks.”
What the hell? That wasn’t what he was talking about. Not at all. “Um, don’t mention it. Look, Rodney, do you . . . when you . . .” God, he was so bad at this. “About what you did in the jumper, on the ride back . . . wait, who’s she?” John fought the sudden stab of jealousy deep in his gut.
“Oh . . . you know . . . nobody. Hallucination. I mean, of course she wasn’t . . . I was just a little . . . you know, concussed.” Rodney flushed.
Oh shit. “So you don’t . . . you didn’t . . . wait . . . what?”
“Okay, you have to promise not to tell anybody,” Rodney looked either way, whispering as though he expected to find someone else hiding in a corner of his small little closet of a room. “But I . . . uh . . . I hallucinated that Lieutenant Colonel Carter was there in the jumper with me. And she kept telling me that you were coming for me and I shouldn’t waste my energy and that I had no chance with her, but then I actually did and . . . well, you don’t want to hear about that, do you? Anyway, to what do I owe the displeasure of you bounding in here at ungodly hours of the morning?”
Houston, we have a problem. Rodney had been hallucinating . . . hallucinating about Colonel Carter, not John. Trying not to let his disappointment show, John ground out, “Oh, nothing, I just thought you might want to spend the day on the beach. Surf a little, sun a little, relax.”
Rodney rolled his eyes. “Yes, because drowning and skin cancer are my two favorite leisurely past-times.”
“C’mon, McKay, it’ll be fun,” John pleaded half-heartedly. “All piña coladas and hula girls.”
“Hula girls? Really?”
“No. But you could always ask Teyla . . .”
“Yeah, sorry, Colonel, but I’m actually very attached to my balls, and with those big sticks of hers . . .”
“We can teach Ronon how to surf.”
“Yes, yes, and it’ll be just like Baywatch, only without the driving force of Pamela Anderson’s spectacular breasts. Emmmm . . . do you think maybe if it’s not a hula skirt we could get Teyla to . . .”
“Maybe she’ll be so grateful you’re still alive that she’ll let you keep on living. But I wouldn’t count on it.” Could they please stop talking about all the gorgeous babes that Rodney’d rather chase futilely around than the guy waiting patiently right before his eyes? Seriously, did he really think he could find someone better for him? Someone who’d put up with his bitching and play Starcraft with him and keep him from blowing himself up?
Rodney shrugged. “Well, I guess it’s been a while since we had a team day.”
Rodney was getting that look - the one where here was secretly excited but too proud to show it. On any other day it would have made John grin, but today he just clapped Rodney on the shoulder and said, “Cool. Meet us in the Jumper Bay in twenty.” He’d planned on dragging Rodney there, without even a stop for the SPF1000, but now he had to radio Ronon and Teyla and dredge up two more surfboards. A few more of Erickson’s marine biology buddies must have them.
John ambled off, trying not to cringe at the bitter finality of the door sliding closed behind him.
2. Beware the Undertow
John was glaring at Ronon. Well, he was trying to glare while pretending to just be squinting at the unnatural brightness of Atlantis’ sun. Sometimes it was great to have someone as terrifyingly physical as Ronon on your team, like, oh say, when you were getting chased around by scary aliens with pulse rifles or needed to interrogate the gibbering idiot of the week, or even when you wanted the last bear-claw at the mess. But it sure as hell sucked when you were trying to show off your manly surfing skills to Mr. Oblivious himself.
“Sheppard, come here, you’re going to look like my mother’s attempt at meat loaf if you don’t put on some sunscreen . . . the woman did not know the meaning of well done. I doubt she even knew edible. That certainly explains my love of airplane food. Anyhow, do you have any idea about the ozone levels of this planet?”
John shook his hair in that way that always seemed to look so good in the movies. Keanu Reeves in Point Break . . . take that.
Rodney just snapped his fingers. “Wasting time. Every second another one of your cells goes melanomic.”
“Really?” Because that would actually really suck.
“I don’t know, do I look like I practice voodoo? Look, your lifetime exposure to radiation is probably even worse than mine, now, please, come here.”
John made a big show of rolling his eyes, but it was actually kind of sweet that Rodney was so concerned about him. He plopped down right on Rodney’s blanket, exposing his back to the man.
“Fine, make me do all the work,” Rodney grumbled. Teyla looked up from where she appeared to be napping to give him an incredulous look. Damn women and their stupid little womany psychic skills. But it was worth it - Rodney’s skilled hands running up and down his back, too firm to be a caress, but with more than enough care to show his concern. John smiled, ordering himself not to get hard, damnit.
“What about him?” John asked, trying not to moan as Rodney’s hands ran down his biceps, tickling the hairs on his arms.
“Hm?”
“Mr. Universe.” John nodded towards where Ronon was in the middle of doing an actual headstand while on the goddamned board. Do not look at his abs, John told himself, pointlessly. In this case, resistance really was futile.
“He’s a big boy. He can take care of himself.”
John spun around. “And that makes me . . .”
“A petulant five year old that needs childproofing to keep him from strapping himself to a nuclear warhead and kamikaze-ing his skinny ass every chance he gets. Seriously, trying to keep you alive is harder than multi-variable spatial dynamics . . . not that it’s particularly difficult once you . . .”
“I . . .”
“I think what Dr. McKay means to say is ‘thank you, Colonel Sheppard, for saving my life,’” Teyla said with a yawn, rolling over to tan her stomach. Rodney’s hands stilled on John’s back. Teyla did look absolutely fantastic in a bikini, but seriously, that was no excuse. John glared.
“So . . . um . . . yes, what she said . . .” Rodney mumbled incoherently, a big blob of sunscreen squirted haphazardly between John’s shoulders.
“Well, as fun as this was . . .” Not. “I think I’d better be heading back out. Gotta teach Ronon how to hang ten.”
“Wait, at least let me finish . . .” Rodney’s voice trailed off into the sound of the surf as John snagged his board and dove in.
Thankfully, it was hard to stay angry with the wind in your hair and the sun on your face and a really fucking big wave . . . shit.
John was under before he could even utter the word out loud, tumbling head over heels beneath the surf, blinded by salt and sand and motion. He came up spluttering, disoriented, and gack, was it just him or was this ocean actually saltier than Earth?
But hey, fingers, toes . . . check, and check. He’d catch up on the rest later. Also, where was his board? John tried vainly to get his feet on the ground, but it seemed as though he’d somehow gotten swept . . . well, this wasn’t good.
He was heading around the point and further away from the jumper and their little camp by the second. Damned rip tide. Fuck the board. He could use the GPS beacon Rodney’d installed to snatch it with the jumper later. Feeling the stretch in his shoulders (God, was he going to be sore later) he swam toward shore, making marginal headway even as the point flew by. But the going was tough, and he must have pulled something because ow.
But his instincts kicked in and before he knew it, he was stumbling to shore, limp and exhausted, but still alive. He wanted to just collapse there in the surf, but then . . . movement. John forced himself to his feet and into a defensive stance, staggering forward to peak that the glimpse of movement beyond the rock just up the shoreline.
“Hello?” he asked. He really hoped that whatever it was happened to be friendly, because he was seriously hurting, and now really wasn’t a good time.
There was a sort of choked screech, and some scrambling and then, before he knew it, he was staring into wide sea-blue eyes. The woman had long auburn hair, wet and clinging to small breasts, leaving the rest pretty much open to speculation.
John cleared his throat, immediately focusing his attention above the neck. Why did this always happen to him? “Um . . . hi . . . I’m Lieutenant Colonel John Sheppard. And you might be?”
The women opened full pink lips and . . . emitted the most horrible screeching noise John had ever heard. It was rude to cover his ears, so he just winced, trying not to remember his demolitions training and all the lectures about protecting your hearing.
“Okay, okay, calm down,” he said, even though she didn’t seem all that threatened. If anything, she looked disappointed, eyes roaming casually over his body. Hey, he worked out, there shouldn’t be anything to complain about. He looked down to check on his abs. He was having trouble managing his belly these days, though he blamed it all on those damned tava beans.
Finished with her inspection, the woman . . . no, girl - she couldn’t be more than sixteen . . . stepped closer, motioning strangely with her hands, pointing to her eyes. And . . . was she trying to mime an airplane? Damn, John was terrible at charades.
“Can I . . . um . . . help you?” John asked. It wasn’t like he routinely ran into mute naked girls on alien beaches or anything. He was feeling a little out of his element here.
The girl made another screech, pointing towards the water.
“Um . . . okay, well, how about you just sit tight and . . .” he wasn’t wearing his jacket, so he didn’t know how to solve this whole nudity thing. Maybe they could just walk back to camp and then figure out where in the hell she came from. The mainland was supposed to be uninhabited, goddamnit.
Then, suddenly, Teyla came barreling around the bend, bouncing just like something straight out of Baywatch. So maybe Rodney was right, after all. “Colonel, thanks to Ancestors you are uninjured. When we saw you ‘wipe out’ we feared for the worst.”
Teyla paused, seeing the girl and took a step back, body taut and fighting-ready. “Who is this?”
“Don’t worry, I don’t think she’s dangerous,” John answered the unasked question.
“That is fortunate. This sun bath wear of yours does not come with a place for the concealment of weapons.”
“That’s okay, I got it.”
John spun around, seeing Ronon dragging his board out of the water, pulling a knife from his hair. He surfed with those? Was he trying to lobotomize himself?
“Hi,” John said.
Ronon grunted, looking suspiciously at the girl. She stared back at him curiously, not threatened in the slightest.
“Where’d you get her?” Ronon asked.
The girl’s face fell.
“I have no idea,” John sighed, letting the tension flow out of him. His team was here now. They’d figure something out. Well, at least they would when Rodney . . .
The sand fluttered up in their faces, causing everyone but Ronon to cover their eyes and squint about. A muffled crash and a large spurt of sand seemed to mark the landing of a puddlejumper.
“McKay,” Ronon remarked, knife still out, as Rodney stepped out from the cloaked jumper. “Why’s it invisible?”
Rodney looked back, confused. “Oh, well, I must have been thinking about danger, seeing as Colonel hair-spray-for-brains has decided that he hasn’t filled his manly-heroics quota for the month and . . .” Rodney turned back around, noticing the startlingly nude addition to their party. “Oh, great!” He threw up his hands in the air. “I don’t know how he does it. Sheppard does something stupid and naked women materialize out of thin air. What kind of incentives system is the universe trying to provide anyhow? Almost die of your own stupidity and bimbos fall from the sky; save the day through wit and courage and god-like intelligence and you get what? Pneumonia and hallucinations?” Rodney addressed the sky. “How is that fair?”
John scowled. Of course Rodney would go there. As though John wanted women throwing themselves at him left and right. All he asked for was the ability to fly and a nice fat cock to fuck himself on, but only in a cruel universe like this one would those things be mutually exclusive.
“And of course, you just love risking . . .” Before he knew it, Rodney was darting forward so fast that John twitched, gasping and holding his hand to the muscles he must have pulled in his neck. “Are you okay?” Rodney continued. “Do we need to get a stretcher? Oh my god, you’ve broken your neck, you . . .”
“I’m fine, McKay,” John sighed. Right now all he wanted was an icepack and a nice long nap.
“Are you sure, because . . .”
A loud screeching noise interrupted the usual Rodney-projected-hypochondriac panic-attack.
“What the hell is that noise? I need my ears, for all that useless hearing I do. I mean, not that it normally pays to listen to the things these idiots have to say, but on principle . . .”
He trailed off, making John spin around, despite the sharp twinge of pain in his neck. Of course, his day could always get worse - the girl was staring at Rodney with this look of naked adoration on her face. Just exactly what John didn’t need right now.
Before John could say anything, or Ronon could throw any of his varied concealed armaments, the girl was darting forward, pressing her perfect perky little breasts up into Rodney chest and burying her face in his neck.
“Um . . . er . . . hi . . . I . . . you . . . ah . . . you must be cold,” Rodney spluttered, patting her awkwardly on the back.
“I think she likes you, McKay,” Ronon remarked with a grin.
“It is quite apparent to us all, Ronon,” Teyla affirmed.
“Yes, yes, well, I could see . . .” Rodney mumbled, pulling off his shirt to reveal blinding whiteness underneath. Of course he would have just the right amount of hair sprinkled lightly across his chest, and the pink peaked nipples that had already been the focus of many of John’s fantasies.
But instead of hanging around, letting John enjoy the view, he helped the girl pull on the shirt, yanking when the synthetic clung to her wet body like a fucking second skin, then putting his arm around her and leading her toward the jumper.
Ronon raised an eyebrow at John, then followed vigilantly, leaving John standing there dumbfounded and a little hurt. Wasn’t it always Rodney that wrapped his arm around John’s waist and helped him out of a tight spot?
“Are you all right, John?” Teyla asked, moving to his side to guide him gently back towards their craft.
“No,” he whispered, but his response was drowned out by Rodney declaring that the girl wouldn’t let go of him, so John would have to drive.
More than just his neck twinged when John settled himself in the pilot’s seat.
<<<>>>
John sighed, palming the icepack Beckett had given him and slowly lowering himself down to his bed. He was stiff now, but it’d be worse tomorrow. He couldn’t believe there was a time of his life when he’d done this pretty much every day for an entire summer. He didn’t remember aches and pains like this.
And Carson was being stingy with the aspirin again. John couldn’t decide whether or not it was due to preoccupation with the medical miracle that was their newest visitor or just the fact that Carson hated when John hurt himself ‘unnecessarily.’ God, it wasn’t as though he liked being so sore that he could barely move.
It was just another frustration to add to the pile - Elizabeth’s scowl, the sunburn on his nose, Rodney’s rejection, and that . . . girl, curling around Rodney like he was her own personal scratching post.
And she was in perfect health, except overexertion and inability to produce any sort of meaningful sound. But did Rodney scan her under the table? Did he snub her and go behind John’s back to try to send her away like he had with Chaya? Of course not. John wasn’t allowed to get Rodney and he certainly wasn’t allowed to get the girl, but Rodney? Rodney could do anything his desperate little heart desired, including treading all over John’s. And he expected John to just stand there and . . .
“Hey,” the door to John’s quarters slide upon, revealing Rodney standing there, shoulders slumped.
“Hey,” John tried to push himself up, but his neck protested and he slid back down.
“Oh, no, just stay there, its okay. Nothing urgent. Here, let me get you some water. I brought you some more aspirin. I’ve got a stash. The labmonkeys have to fork over a pill every time they make a life-endangering mistake. It’d sicken you to know how much I’ve got stored up.”
“So you don’t just make them cry or cower in terror, you extort them for drugs as well.”
“Yep, pretty much. Look, I’m sorry I came by so late. It’s just she . . . I don’t know, the girl. She wouldn’t let go of me, and she almost cried every time I tried to leave her. I couldn’t . . . . She’s asleep though. Carson says her body’s been through some sort of system-wide trauma recently. I suppose it has something to do with how she got here. Nobody can figure out that screeching noise.”
“Thanks for the update,” John mumbled. But then Rodney placed two white tablets in his hand. “And the aspirin.”
“You’re welcome.” Rodney handed him a glass of water, then took it away after he swallowed. “Are you sure you’re okay? I heard Carson say something about strains . . . granted she was crying then so I couldn’t really hear, but he said you might have to . . .”
“It’s not as bad as last time.” They’d both try not to remember that one, after Gall and Abrams, that pesky neck brace. “You only get to see me in a collar for a day or so.”
“Oh,” Rodney said, sitting down on the bed at John’s waist. The heat suffused against his side felt good. “Well, a collar would only be good for you if it came along with a leash.”
John choked out a chuckle. “Very funny . . . ow.” Laughing was too much movement for now.
“Here,” Rodney said, “Let me.” And then there were warm fingers dancing down his spine, circling, kneading the hard little pebbles of muscle away. John moaned, drifting slowly off to sleep.
His last thought was that it always had to be like this - so close he could feel it, yet so far away. He only vaguely remembered Rodney leaving, warm hands patting his back, “feel better, Colonel.”
Always Colonel, never John.
<<<>>>
Of course, if John thought that the whole massage thing made them closer, he was most definitely wrong. After that, Rodney was never seen out of sight of that . . . that girl. She was young, sure, and maybe Rodney wasn’t too much of a pedophile type, but there was only so much adoration and groping a straight guy could take before he submitted and let the little slut seduce him. John knew. He’d been jailbait himself back in the day.
John rolled his eyes as they entered the mess, feeling Teyla kick him lightly beneath the table. “You should be proud of Rodney. He is at least making an effort to take care of our guest.” Of course Teyla would also be taken by her. Underneath all that strong warrior-woman stuff, Teyla really did just have a goddamned bleeding heart.
John snorted into his cornflakes.
“I understand you are jealous of her friendship with Dr. McKay, but that is no reason . . .”
“Friendship? Is that what your people call it?” It was Ronon’s turn to receive a kick under the table.
“Ronon, you should be ashamed of yourself. It is not Rodney’s way to take advantage of . . .”
Rodney strolled over, a bright smile on his face. John gave his scrambled eggs a vicious poke. He hadn’t seen Rodney this happy since the chefs figured out how to turn Sip’al fruit into jelly doughnuts. “I was just showing our guest here how to modulate the shielding frequencies. She has quite a knack for it you, know. I think I might just go ahead and let her have the job. It’ll allow me to demote Kavanagh to cappuccino-girl duty like I always wanted to. We’ll have to find him a hair net, though.”
“You know, she probably has a name, McKay,” Ronon remarked, spraying a few spare pieces of scrambled eggs when he spoke. John brushed them off his tray, used to it by now.
“Yes, yes, unfortunately she can’t actually say it, now can she. Carson said something about brain waves and language function and blah, blah, blah. She understands just fine. Besides, I always wanted a woman who could hold her tongue.”
That got Rodney a kick under the table. “What? I didn’t say all women should be seen not heard!” Another kick. “Teyla! This has nothing to do with you. Seriously, I’m all for feminists . . . er . . . girlpower . . . um, bra burning . . .”
John rolled his eyes.
“Maybe we can name her. I always liked Marie, but would that be too cliché . . .”
“You will not name her as you would a pet, Rodney!” Teyla was starting to do that mothering thing again. John scooted his shins out of striking distance, just in case.
“And besides, Marie?” Since when was Rodney classy enough to pull off a French girlfriend?
“Maybe we can guess,” Ronon offered.
The girl nodded at him, enthusiastically.
“Bertha,” John suggested.
“Oh, please. She’s much too . . . ah . . . er . . . well, she’s very um . . . intelligent. Beautiful . . . she’s not a Bertha.”
Rodney smiled at the girl. She smiled back. Her teeth were perfect. It made John want to puke.
“Well, how about, Mildred?”
“She looks like a Restalari to me,” Ronon said, between bites of jelly doughnut.
“Or perhaps an Ary’l,” Teyla put in.
“Good one,” Ronon approved.
Huh. Different galaxy, almost infinite combination of names. This was going to be difficult.
Coming to the same conclusion, Rodney frowned, but he soon brightened. “Well, I guess this just means that I’ll have to teach you how to write.”
“In the meantime, why don’t we just call her . . .”
“Ary’l sounds good to me,” Ronon declared. And nobody disagreed with Ronon when he declared.
Ary’l seemed pleased. John, on the other hand, was not.
“Oh, that’s a good girl,” Rodney praised. “Look, unlike some mouth-breathing barbarians, she knows how to use a fork now.”
John rolled his eyes. The first time she’d seen it, she’d try to use the thing to brush her hair. How smart could she really be? She probably couldn’t get into Mensa.
3. What Triton Wants, Triton Gets
If John had thought it was bad before, it was worse now that they’d started up on missions again. He barely saw Rodney anymore, and when he did, Ary’l was always trailing after him like a little lost puppy dog or something. And instead of kicking her, the way he seemed to do with all helpless labtechs and people who got underfoot in general, he seemed to actually enjoy the attention. God, John didn’t even know desperate was Rodney’s type.
And when they went out on missions, she’d huddle up next to Elizabeth in the Gateroom, eyes watery and pathetic. The first two times, she’d whined so high-pitched and screechy that John was afraid she’d break the glass of Elizabeth’s office walls.
“I hear she sleeps in his bedroom,” Cadman said, breaking John out of his stupor. “I mean, I would’ve figured McKay for a little kinky. Beyond all that babbling awkwardness there’s got to be some sort of seriously repressed animal, you know?”
John didn’t know. That was sort of the point.
“But I guess I can’t blame him. If someone looked at me like that, I’m not sure I could say no,” Cadman continued, casually reaching around to fix one of the buckles on John’s pack. Was he really getting that careless?
“How does she look at him?” John mumbled, though he wasn’t quite sure why. It was obvious.
“Like he’s the whole reason for her existence. I mean, screw the laws, right? Carson says he can’t even determine her exact age anyway. She’s old enough to fall in love with him.”
“Yeah, well, I guess we’ll just have to wait and see what Rodney’s decided.”
Cadman smirked at that, giving her weapon one last check before heading out the door. “I know what he’s decided. Came and asked me for advice last night. I’ve got them set up for a romantic dinner up in the observatory tonight. Stars floating above their heads, a warm sea breeze, French wine and a home cooked meal - and she doesn’t even seem to mind if Rodney talks too much, so really, what could go wrong?”
“Tonight?” John asked, barely conscious of Elizabeth’s usual farewell salutation before he stepped through the gate. Rodney planned a romantic dinner for the day John was going off with Cadman’s team to check out a possible beta site?
“That’s what I said,” Cadman answered. “How will he ever pull it off without me?”
Then there was a flash of light, and it all went black.
<<<>>>
The next thing John knew, someone was slapping his face. Hard, too.
“Hey,” John gasped. “Stop that.” He had a mother of a headache, and things felt off enough as it was. Was all the hitting really necessary?
“Thank god, Sir.” It was Harris’ voice. Good ‘ole Harris, never missed the southern accent. “Are you okay to move?”
It was dark. When did it get dark? And John felt sort of dizzy - nauseous. What was going on? “Report?” John asked.
“Some sort of ambush, Sir. Stun grenades. Not energy-based like the Wraith ones. Good old flash bangs, with a lot more oomph. You got the most exposure. Look, we’re in a defensible position right now, but we have to move.”
God, John was dizzy and it was really dark. He tried to struggle up, but how was he supposed to find his bearings like this?
“Cadman?”
“We split up. She and Schwartz are in a cave about a three clicks from here. The plan is to sit tight and wait for backup to come through the next time Dr. Weir opens the gate and we can signal her.”
“Good plan,” John muttered, massaging his temples. “Why’s it so dark in here?”
“Oh, um . . . Sir . . . it’s not. You’re just experiencing a side effect of the stun grenade. My vision was off for an hour or so, but I can see fine now.”
“An hour? How long’ve I been out?”
“Two and a half, Sir. You hit your head when you fell. Been in and out of it for a while. Said some pretty weird things.”
“Like what?” John really wished he could see Harris’ face right now. He needed to read whether or not there was going to be a serious problem with this.
“Well, I don’t want to ask and you don’t have to tell, but in my humble opinion, Sir, you should just go for it.”
“Go for what?” And since when did Baptist Marines from Georgia give big fat gay love advice anyhow? Wasn’t this the part where John got the shit beat out of him?
“You know, that whole hard-on you’ve got for . . .”
“Harris?” John heard Cadman’s voice drifting over a nearby radio and suddenly remembered to panic about this whole temporary blindness deal. Where was Rodney? He had to find Rodney . . .
“Here, Ma’am.”
“I’ve got backup coming in. Just hang tight, okay?”
“Yeah, tight . . .” John slurred, before losing consciousness again.
<<<>>>
When John woke up, Rodney wasn’t there. He was in the infirmary, if that really mattered. Everything was blurry, bright white blobs floating in and out of his vision.
Carson said that everything was fine, that the shock would wear off on its own. Except John knew it wouldn’t. Where the hell was Rodney?
Had she kidnapped him? Maybe this was like the thing with Chaya, only she was - you know, evil. And . . . yes, evil. Redheads, immediately in love with Rodney McKay, high screechy voice - incontrovertible signs of pure unadulterated badness.
John lurched to his feet, yanking out the IV without even a second thought. It was, of course, not the first time he’d done that. Now, where did Cadman say? Oh, yes, the observatory. And that was . . . where, exactly?
John stumbled out the infirmary doors and down the corridor. It was frighteningly easy. Carson was just too damned trusting. John grinned a bit at that, stumbling into the nearest transporter. Where was he going again?
Oh, yes, Rodney, evil girl, observatory. Candles. Was there a fire hazard? Was he even in charge of fire hazards? He could have sworn he’d delegated that one.
John practically fell out of the transporter and into . . . hey . . . they were getting a little friendly there. Not good, leaning in like that. If Rodney wasn’t careful, he might lead the girl on. Or maybe catch her hair on fire.
“That’s dangerous,” John said. It was kinda dark in here. His vision was blurry.
“Sheppard?” Rodney asked, incredulous. “What are you . . . oh, my god, is there a Wraith attack? Is the city sinking?” He tapped on his earpiece. “Hello, Chuck . . . Gateroom guy . . . eh . . . did you try rerouting power from the secondary generation capacitors . . . what do you mean ‘your name’s not Chuck?’ Chuck, this is no time for a thing like this . . . ‘what thing like this?’ Chuck, I’ve got Sheppard here, white as a sheet, interrupting what would otherwise be a spectacular date and . . .”
Rodney narrowed his eyes and stood abruptly, dragging a little bit of the tablecloth with him, before rushing to John’s side. “What’re you doing here? Are you okay?”
John considered that for a moment. He was feeling a little off. For one, the floor looked a little further away than he was used to. And it was pretty dark in here. Then he remembered pervasive darkness, Harris’ soft southern accent and the fear . . . “I was afraid,” he said. “You weren’t there.”
In the background, the girl looked on impatiently. John scowled at her. She shouldn’t even be on a date with Rodney anyhow. It was past her bedtime.
“John?” Rodney whispered. His grip was warm on John’s arm.
John blinked, and then somehow he was laying on the ground, his head resting on Rodney’s lap, panicked babble rushing by above him.
“Rodney?”
“Oh, good. Carson’s on his way. You just . . . you stay there. What happened anyhow?”
“Mission went south.” John winced. His head was starting to pound again. “Concussion.”
Rodney sighed, his fingers trailing lazily through John’s hair. John smiled. This was the life.
<<<>>>
“Not so fast, Colonel. I’m not quite done with ya yet,” Carson said. He didn’t even look up from the chart he was looking at, the bastard.
John groaned. He was tired (even though he’d spent the last day or so pretty much sleeping). And his head still hurt. All he wanted was to get back to his own quarters and curl up for a nice long nap.
“Groan all you want, but you’re staying,” Carson chided. “You know I don’t enjoy you when you’re bored and grumpy anymore than you do, but believe me, I’m doing this for your own good.”
John hung his head shame-facedly. “Sorry, doc. I just want to get out of here before uh . . . Rodney comes back.”
Carson nodded. “Aye, I can sympathize, Colonel. I do not envy you listening to that . . . er . . . noise, with a headache like I’m sure you’re sporting.”
“Why does she do that anyhow?”
“As far as I can tell, there’s nothing wrong with the way that she interprets sound - almost as though she already understood our language - suggests she’d been through the gate, it does. But when we took cerebral scans we found that the speech centers of her brain were configured quite differently. It’s not that she can’t make noise, but that she doesn’t seem to understand how to control vocal cords.” He shrugged. “Can’t for the life of me figure out why.”
“And you don’t think that’s, um . . . sinister?”
Carson laughed, fingers finding John’s pulse. “Hardly, Colonel. She’s a dear, that one. Poor thing must have gone through some sort of trauma. That’s the best I can come up with. Gets a wee bit screechy when she’s upset, but I cannot even be sure it’s conscious. Could be a form of retardation, though from what Rodney tells me, she’s a bit of a savant. He’s taught her all sorts of things. She’s very good with harmonics, apparently.”
John scowled. Rodney used to teach him things. “But why does she always have to screech so much around me?” He knew he was whining, but he’d had the mother of all migraines; high-pitched choking was probably the last thing he needed.
“I think it’s perfectly obvious, Colonel. For some completely unfathomable reason she’s attached herself to Rodney.”
“No kidding,” John mumbled, sighing theatrically when Carson shone the goddamned penlight in his eyes for the five bazillionth time in the past two days.
“She’s jealous of the attention he gives you. Honestly, the times he’s brought her in here on her own she’s been quiet as a mouse. I showed her the gene sequencing software - kept her occupied for hours.”
“Yeah, well, she needs to get used to Rodney spending time with other people. I need him back on my team.”
Carson sighed. “Aye. You know, I think she’d feel a wee bit more secure if he’d just . . . erm . . . accept what she’s offering.” Carson blushed. Thank god the man didn’t go into gynecology. John suddenly felt very very sorry for the poor Athosian women Carson saw on the mainland.
“You don’t think she’s a little young for him, Doc?”
Carson shrugged. “To tell ya the truth, we have no real way of knowing exactly how old she is. Wear and tear, diseases, dental health, things we normally use as indicators of age are all as perfect as a newborn babe. She’s most likely younger than him, but clearly old enough to make her own decisions. I don’t begrudge her the opportunity. And Rodney either, for that fact. He’s been under too much stress recently. And that whole debacle with Katie. He could use someone to take good care of him.”
Yes, and that someone could be John. Couldn’t it? Why not? “I guess.”
“It upsetting you that he’s the one to get the girl this time?”
“No,” John said, with hesitation. It bothered him that this time, the girl might get Rodney.
ON TO PART TWO