Fic - Lonely Hearts
Here is the fourth part - one more to go.
Author’s Notes:- Thanks to Stonedtoad for betaing.
I’m not too sure I like this chapter as I feel I may have rushed through it but by the time I wrote the second part of it I’d had it sitting with a few paragraphs for weeks.
Anyway hope you enjoy and the final chapter will be up soon.
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Radek frowned as he entered Rodney’s lab to find it empty. He’d been looking for the other man for the past hour; they’d had a meeting scheduled so they could work out a schedule to explore the latest labs uncovered. A meeting that Rodney hadn’t turned up for. It was completely out of character for Rodney to miss meetings like this without a very good reason.
“Rodney?” he tried the radio, “Rodney?”
He sighed when he received no answer, beginning to worry now, Rodney went nowhere without his radio. As he headed out Radek almost ran into Kavanagh who stopped dead.
“Is McKay in there?” Kavanagh demanded.
“No,” Radek replied.
“Damn,” Kavanagh snapped annoyed, “I need to talk to him. Dr Matthews is absolutely…”
“I know,” Radek agreed.
Kavanagh moved to Rodney’s computer to see if there was any clue to where he was.
“Look at this,” he called to Radek, “Do you know what that is?”
Radek frowned as he looked at the energy readings on the computer. For something like this Rodney should have said to someone to go check it out, not go himself.
“Rodney, answer me,” Radek tried the radio once more before turning to the other scientist; “We should go see Dr Weir.”
For the first time in a long time both men were in agreement.
“Why?” Cadman snapped turning on Rodney, “Why is it every time you’re around something happens?”
“This isn’t my fault,” Rodney defended himself.
Cadman let out a snort of derision, “Oh please, Rodney, trouble follows you around like a puppy dog.”
Rodney was about retort when he saw a shadow falling across her face; he grabbed her arm pulling her towards him as a wall slammed down where she had been standing completely blocking their way out. They stared at it.
“Okay what the hell is going on?” Cadman demanded as she yanked her arm away from his grip.
“I have no idea,” Rodney replied his eyes wide in astonishment as the room went from being one big room into several, “But it’s not a good thing.”
“Okay, call someone,” Cadman ordered.
“Why don’t you?” he folded his arms across his chest.
“Because I don’t have my radio with me,” she replied, “I was meeting a friend then going for lunch.”
“Fine,” he snapped back, “Zelenka, this is McKay,” a frown covered his face as no one answered, “Sheppard? Weir? Somebody, anybody answer me?” He looked at Cadman as colour drained from his face, “No one’s answering.”
“Meaning we’re on our own,” Cadman said.
“I’d say that’s a good assumption,” Rodney whispered swallowing hard.
“You’re the genius, Rodney,” Cadman snapped at him, “How do we get out of here?”
Rodney licked his lips, “We have to find out what this place is first which means finding a computer,” he glanced around the small area they were standing in, “There’s nothing here.”
“Then we’ll have to check the rest of this place,” Cadman replied annoyed.
Rodney grabbed her arm pulling her back from the opening she was about to walk through, “I don’t think that’s a good idea, Cadman, we don’t know what’s in here.”
“And what do you suggest Rodney?” she demanded annoyed, “That we sit down here and wait for some sort of rescue?”
“Well someone will notice I’m missing very quickly,” he reminded her, “And your friend should notice when you don’t turn up for lunch.”
“Good plan, Rodney,” she retorted, “Let’s just sit here and wait. And until we get out of here we’ll just sit down and talk like we do every time we get trapped together.”
He flushed at her words, “It’s the safest thing to do especially since you only have the use of one arm.”
“Rodney,” her voice softened, “We need to do something. You know that.”
He let out a sigh and nodded, “Fine. I’ll go first.”
“Be my guest,” she told him.
Rodney grimaced and moved to the exit of the small area they were standing in. Cautiously he looked down the very short corridor and moved slowly with Cadman behind him into the next room. They both jumped as a door slammed shut behind them.
“Oh this is bad,” Rodney breathed, “This is very bad.”
*********************************************
“Do we know what this area is?” Elizabeth demanded.
“No,” Zelenka said, “Dr Kavanagh and I have gone over all the readings but it is taking time to discover anything from the database.”
“Has anyone managed to contact Rodney?” John asked.
Kavanagh shook his head, “There appears to be interference, meaning we can’t contact him.”
“Typical,” John muttered, “Alright, we need to know what this place is, how to get through the interference and how to get him out.”
“We are working on it,” Radek replied, “But there is another problem.”
“Dare I even ask?” John muttered.
Zelenka frowned, “Lieutenant Cadman is also missing.”
“No,” John groaned, “Not again. What the hell is with those two?”
“It’s be easier for us all if they’d get on with it,” Carson spoke up from the door making everyone turn to him a little surprised, “And we just know one of them will be injured.”
“Then let’s get them out as fast as possible,” Elizabeth told them.
“So,” Cadman mused looking around the small room as Rodney was tinkering inside the panel on the wall, “Anything yet?”
“If I had something I’d tell you,” Rodney threw over his shoulder before returning to his work.
Cadman rolled her eyes tilting her head she watched his back seeing how tense he was she felt a strong impulse to rub his neck and quickly smothered that impulse.
“Son of a…” he snapped jerking away from the wall and sucking his fingers, “Damn crystals. This has to be the most idiotic places I have ever…”
“Rodney,” she cut him off, “Shut up.”
He glared at her before turning back to the panel, “Why do I have to be stuck here with you?”
“Because life sucks, Rodney,” she retorted, “And takes great pleasure in making us both miserable.”
She was shocked as he looked quite hurt for a second before turning back to work. Instead of apologising, she leaned back against a wall wondering what the look had meant.
“Got it,” Rodney finally cried, “I’m into the database and…”
“And?”
Rodney turned to her his eyes wide, “Ah, we have a problem.”
“We’re stuck in here,” Cadman reminded him wishing she could cross her arms defiantly, “With no way out? What’s worse?”
At his expression she started cursing herself for asking the question.
“Rodney,” she pleaded, “Please just tell me you’re messing with me and all you have to do is put some crystal in place and we’re out of here?”
“If only,” he sighed, “This part of the city is used as a kind of training area. We knew the Ancients once they started fighting the Wraith had to have trained their military some way.”
“Here?” she motioned the room.
Rodney nodded, “The room becomes several small areas designed to test certain aspects of their military.”
“So,” Cadman cried, “Fix it and get us out of here.”
“I can’t,” he replied softly, “Someone’s locked the system, I’ll have to hack in, which is going to take a long time.”
“We can survive that,” she told him sighing as he frowned guiltily, “We can’t survive that?”
“No,” he replied, “Whoever did this has set up one of the training programmes; we’re going to have to get out of this the hard way.”
“Stupid, stupid, stupid,” Zelenka yelled at the computer, “How did they manage to build this place yet be so abominably idiotic.”
“Something wrong?” John asked from his spot near the door his nervous pacing halted for the moment.
“I have discovered where they are,” Zelenka explained, “And I have also discovered what it is.”
“So the problem?” John looked resigned.
“It has been encrypted,” the Czech scientist hit the side of the laptop screen, “Meaning this was deliberate.”
“Someone deliberately sent those two down into the depths of Atlantis and locked them in there,” John said incredulously then nodded slightly, “Wish I’d thought of that.”
“If only it was that simple,” Zelenka told him, “Where they are was the ancients training facility. It has been activated with one of the simulations.”
John stared at him waiting for the punchline.
“The simulation has no safety protocols on, Colonel,” Zelenka continued grimly, “If we can’t get them out or at least fix it so the safety is on then they could both end up dead.”
John dropped his head into his hands, “Crap.”
*********************************************
“Run,” Rodney snapped grabbing Cadman’s good hand and yanking her through the maze of corridors trying to get to the next room with a computer console.
Cadman kept up with him easily as they scrambled along the corridors. Seeing a panel hanging loose she yanked her hand out of his and grabbed it throwing it against the strange robotic creature following them. The panel slammed against it tossing it against the wall and Cadman sighed in relief.
“We’ve got time, Rodney,” she told him seeing him sigh trying to catch his breath.
Rodney found the next room and walked in going straight to the computer.
“Why did you come down here anyway?” Cadman asked, the thought had just arrived.
“I noticed some strange energy readings,” he replied absently, “What about you?”
“I…” she frowned in realisation, “I was down here to meet Kim.”
“Kim?”
“Dr Matthews,” she told him, “She said to meet her down here. She said she’d discovered something I’d love…”
“Why would Matthews do this?” Rodney asked confused.
Cadman let out a deep sigh, “I don’t know. She’s always seemed so nice.”
“It’s probably some sort of mistake,” Rodney replied, “She doesn’t have access to this sort of thing.”
Cadman folded her good arm across her churning stomach, “It’s possible she managed to get it. Let’s work out how to get out of here then work out who got us into this.”
Rodney nodded his eyes lingering on her for a few more seconds before he returned to his work. Cadman felt a shiver slide along her spine at the way he looked at her, a little confused, but didn’t get a chance to think about it as the walls started to close in on them.
“Shit,” she snapped and they started running again.
“Come on, come on,” Rodney yelled at the computer he was currently tampering with, “Cadman, get ready. If I do this wrong we could end up…”
“Dead,” she finished for him flatly.
“Or horribly mutilated,” he replied, “Here goes.”
Cadman held her breath waiting for the next horror to happen. She was actually amazed they’d survived so long considering some things the Ancients had stuck in here. Rodney looked exhausted, each time they got to a safe room she at least got to rest for a moment, while he continuously worked on a way to get them out safely.
Cadman grinned as she saw the door open across from them, “You did it Rodney,” she laughed grabbing him around his neck in a quick hug.
She pulled away suddenly looking embarrassed, “Sorry.”
He shook his head and motioned her forward, “Let’s get out of here.”
Cadman grinned at him, “Good idea, genius.”
They started towards the door at a fast walk, neither wanting to spend anymore time in there than they had to, but neither able to run. As they finally reached the exit a final trap was set off. Cadman felt Rodney shove her through the door as gas started pouring from the vents.
“Rodney,” she cried as he was caught in a cloud.
Taking a deep breath she ducked back inside grabbing his arm and dragging him outside slamming the panel closing the door before dropping down beside him.
“Rodney, Cadman,” Carson called as he came around the corner followed by a medical team.
Cadman smiled slightly as Rodney gasped at her side.
“Here you go, Rodney,” Carson arrived at their side with some oxygen; Cadman wondered why he’d brought that before realising the odds were pretty good he’d need it.
Cadman gently rubbed Rodney’s back as he gasped in the oxygen, watching as the gang of scientists led by Zelenka carefully started to examine the room.
“That’s it,” Carson said looking down at them, “I’m tagging the pair of you and when you’re within ten feet of each other, I’m putting my team on alert.”
“Funny,” Rodney gasped glaring at the doctor.
“Keep that on and don’t talk,” Carson ordered before turning to Cadman, “What about you?”
She held up her hand, “I’m fine Carson. Rodney was the action hero in this.”
“Well make sure he keeps the mask on while I report to Elizabeth,” Carson smiled at her.
Cadman gave him a quick smile back before rolling her eyes slamming the mask back onto Rodney as he tried to remove it. She heard footsteps coming and glanced up to see Kim coming towards them. Kim wore a deep scowl when she saw them sitting together which quickly changed to a relieved smile but Cadman had seen the anger in the other woman’s eyes.
Cadman turned to Rodney who was still sucking in deep gulps of oxygen, she noted her hand resting at the back of his neck and realisation hit her. Kim wanted Rodney, Cadman couldn’t understand why but she knew Rodney had broken it off after one date. Rodney moved slightly below her hand, not shrugging away the comfort she was giving and she understood. Kim blamed her for Rodney dropping her, meaning that the friendly Dr Matthews had just tried to kill her.
Author’s Notes:- Thanks to Stonedtoad for betaing.
I’m not too sure I like this chapter as I feel I may have rushed through it but by the time I wrote the second part of it I’d had it sitting with a few paragraphs for weeks.
Anyway hope you enjoy and the final chapter will be up soon.
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Radek frowned as he entered Rodney’s lab to find it empty. He’d been looking for the other man for the past hour; they’d had a meeting scheduled so they could work out a schedule to explore the latest labs uncovered. A meeting that Rodney hadn’t turned up for. It was completely out of character for Rodney to miss meetings like this without a very good reason.
“Rodney?” he tried the radio, “Rodney?”
He sighed when he received no answer, beginning to worry now, Rodney went nowhere without his radio. As he headed out Radek almost ran into Kavanagh who stopped dead.
“Is McKay in there?” Kavanagh demanded.
“No,” Radek replied.
“Damn,” Kavanagh snapped annoyed, “I need to talk to him. Dr Matthews is absolutely…”
“I know,” Radek agreed.
Kavanagh moved to Rodney’s computer to see if there was any clue to where he was.
“Look at this,” he called to Radek, “Do you know what that is?”
Radek frowned as he looked at the energy readings on the computer. For something like this Rodney should have said to someone to go check it out, not go himself.
“Rodney, answer me,” Radek tried the radio once more before turning to the other scientist; “We should go see Dr Weir.”
For the first time in a long time both men were in agreement.
“Why?” Cadman snapped turning on Rodney, “Why is it every time you’re around something happens?”
“This isn’t my fault,” Rodney defended himself.
Cadman let out a snort of derision, “Oh please, Rodney, trouble follows you around like a puppy dog.”
Rodney was about retort when he saw a shadow falling across her face; he grabbed her arm pulling her towards him as a wall slammed down where she had been standing completely blocking their way out. They stared at it.
“Okay what the hell is going on?” Cadman demanded as she yanked her arm away from his grip.
“I have no idea,” Rodney replied his eyes wide in astonishment as the room went from being one big room into several, “But it’s not a good thing.”
“Okay, call someone,” Cadman ordered.
“Why don’t you?” he folded his arms across his chest.
“Because I don’t have my radio with me,” she replied, “I was meeting a friend then going for lunch.”
“Fine,” he snapped back, “Zelenka, this is McKay,” a frown covered his face as no one answered, “Sheppard? Weir? Somebody, anybody answer me?” He looked at Cadman as colour drained from his face, “No one’s answering.”
“Meaning we’re on our own,” Cadman said.
“I’d say that’s a good assumption,” Rodney whispered swallowing hard.
“You’re the genius, Rodney,” Cadman snapped at him, “How do we get out of here?”
Rodney licked his lips, “We have to find out what this place is first which means finding a computer,” he glanced around the small area they were standing in, “There’s nothing here.”
“Then we’ll have to check the rest of this place,” Cadman replied annoyed.
Rodney grabbed her arm pulling her back from the opening she was about to walk through, “I don’t think that’s a good idea, Cadman, we don’t know what’s in here.”
“And what do you suggest Rodney?” she demanded annoyed, “That we sit down here and wait for some sort of rescue?”
“Well someone will notice I’m missing very quickly,” he reminded her, “And your friend should notice when you don’t turn up for lunch.”
“Good plan, Rodney,” she retorted, “Let’s just sit here and wait. And until we get out of here we’ll just sit down and talk like we do every time we get trapped together.”
He flushed at her words, “It’s the safest thing to do especially since you only have the use of one arm.”
“Rodney,” her voice softened, “We need to do something. You know that.”
He let out a sigh and nodded, “Fine. I’ll go first.”
“Be my guest,” she told him.
Rodney grimaced and moved to the exit of the small area they were standing in. Cautiously he looked down the very short corridor and moved slowly with Cadman behind him into the next room. They both jumped as a door slammed shut behind them.
“Oh this is bad,” Rodney breathed, “This is very bad.”
*********************************************
“Do we know what this area is?” Elizabeth demanded.
“No,” Zelenka said, “Dr Kavanagh and I have gone over all the readings but it is taking time to discover anything from the database.”
“Has anyone managed to contact Rodney?” John asked.
Kavanagh shook his head, “There appears to be interference, meaning we can’t contact him.”
“Typical,” John muttered, “Alright, we need to know what this place is, how to get through the interference and how to get him out.”
“We are working on it,” Radek replied, “But there is another problem.”
“Dare I even ask?” John muttered.
Zelenka frowned, “Lieutenant Cadman is also missing.”
“No,” John groaned, “Not again. What the hell is with those two?”
“It’s be easier for us all if they’d get on with it,” Carson spoke up from the door making everyone turn to him a little surprised, “And we just know one of them will be injured.”
“Then let’s get them out as fast as possible,” Elizabeth told them.
“So,” Cadman mused looking around the small room as Rodney was tinkering inside the panel on the wall, “Anything yet?”
“If I had something I’d tell you,” Rodney threw over his shoulder before returning to his work.
Cadman rolled her eyes tilting her head she watched his back seeing how tense he was she felt a strong impulse to rub his neck and quickly smothered that impulse.
“Son of a…” he snapped jerking away from the wall and sucking his fingers, “Damn crystals. This has to be the most idiotic places I have ever…”
“Rodney,” she cut him off, “Shut up.”
He glared at her before turning back to the panel, “Why do I have to be stuck here with you?”
“Because life sucks, Rodney,” she retorted, “And takes great pleasure in making us both miserable.”
She was shocked as he looked quite hurt for a second before turning back to work. Instead of apologising, she leaned back against a wall wondering what the look had meant.
“Got it,” Rodney finally cried, “I’m into the database and…”
“And?”
Rodney turned to her his eyes wide, “Ah, we have a problem.”
“We’re stuck in here,” Cadman reminded him wishing she could cross her arms defiantly, “With no way out? What’s worse?”
At his expression she started cursing herself for asking the question.
“Rodney,” she pleaded, “Please just tell me you’re messing with me and all you have to do is put some crystal in place and we’re out of here?”
“If only,” he sighed, “This part of the city is used as a kind of training area. We knew the Ancients once they started fighting the Wraith had to have trained their military some way.”
“Here?” she motioned the room.
Rodney nodded, “The room becomes several small areas designed to test certain aspects of their military.”
“So,” Cadman cried, “Fix it and get us out of here.”
“I can’t,” he replied softly, “Someone’s locked the system, I’ll have to hack in, which is going to take a long time.”
“We can survive that,” she told him sighing as he frowned guiltily, “We can’t survive that?”
“No,” he replied, “Whoever did this has set up one of the training programmes; we’re going to have to get out of this the hard way.”
“Stupid, stupid, stupid,” Zelenka yelled at the computer, “How did they manage to build this place yet be so abominably idiotic.”
“Something wrong?” John asked from his spot near the door his nervous pacing halted for the moment.
“I have discovered where they are,” Zelenka explained, “And I have also discovered what it is.”
“So the problem?” John looked resigned.
“It has been encrypted,” the Czech scientist hit the side of the laptop screen, “Meaning this was deliberate.”
“Someone deliberately sent those two down into the depths of Atlantis and locked them in there,” John said incredulously then nodded slightly, “Wish I’d thought of that.”
“If only it was that simple,” Zelenka told him, “Where they are was the ancients training facility. It has been activated with one of the simulations.”
John stared at him waiting for the punchline.
“The simulation has no safety protocols on, Colonel,” Zelenka continued grimly, “If we can’t get them out or at least fix it so the safety is on then they could both end up dead.”
John dropped his head into his hands, “Crap.”
*********************************************
“Run,” Rodney snapped grabbing Cadman’s good hand and yanking her through the maze of corridors trying to get to the next room with a computer console.
Cadman kept up with him easily as they scrambled along the corridors. Seeing a panel hanging loose she yanked her hand out of his and grabbed it throwing it against the strange robotic creature following them. The panel slammed against it tossing it against the wall and Cadman sighed in relief.
“We’ve got time, Rodney,” she told him seeing him sigh trying to catch his breath.
Rodney found the next room and walked in going straight to the computer.
“Why did you come down here anyway?” Cadman asked, the thought had just arrived.
“I noticed some strange energy readings,” he replied absently, “What about you?”
“I…” she frowned in realisation, “I was down here to meet Kim.”
“Kim?”
“Dr Matthews,” she told him, “She said to meet her down here. She said she’d discovered something I’d love…”
“Why would Matthews do this?” Rodney asked confused.
Cadman let out a deep sigh, “I don’t know. She’s always seemed so nice.”
“It’s probably some sort of mistake,” Rodney replied, “She doesn’t have access to this sort of thing.”
Cadman folded her good arm across her churning stomach, “It’s possible she managed to get it. Let’s work out how to get out of here then work out who got us into this.”
Rodney nodded his eyes lingering on her for a few more seconds before he returned to his work. Cadman felt a shiver slide along her spine at the way he looked at her, a little confused, but didn’t get a chance to think about it as the walls started to close in on them.
“Shit,” she snapped and they started running again.
“Come on, come on,” Rodney yelled at the computer he was currently tampering with, “Cadman, get ready. If I do this wrong we could end up…”
“Dead,” she finished for him flatly.
“Or horribly mutilated,” he replied, “Here goes.”
Cadman held her breath waiting for the next horror to happen. She was actually amazed they’d survived so long considering some things the Ancients had stuck in here. Rodney looked exhausted, each time they got to a safe room she at least got to rest for a moment, while he continuously worked on a way to get them out safely.
Cadman grinned as she saw the door open across from them, “You did it Rodney,” she laughed grabbing him around his neck in a quick hug.
She pulled away suddenly looking embarrassed, “Sorry.”
He shook his head and motioned her forward, “Let’s get out of here.”
Cadman grinned at him, “Good idea, genius.”
They started towards the door at a fast walk, neither wanting to spend anymore time in there than they had to, but neither able to run. As they finally reached the exit a final trap was set off. Cadman felt Rodney shove her through the door as gas started pouring from the vents.
“Rodney,” she cried as he was caught in a cloud.
Taking a deep breath she ducked back inside grabbing his arm and dragging him outside slamming the panel closing the door before dropping down beside him.
“Rodney, Cadman,” Carson called as he came around the corner followed by a medical team.
Cadman smiled slightly as Rodney gasped at her side.
“Here you go, Rodney,” Carson arrived at their side with some oxygen; Cadman wondered why he’d brought that before realising the odds were pretty good he’d need it.
Cadman gently rubbed Rodney’s back as he gasped in the oxygen, watching as the gang of scientists led by Zelenka carefully started to examine the room.
“That’s it,” Carson said looking down at them, “I’m tagging the pair of you and when you’re within ten feet of each other, I’m putting my team on alert.”
“Funny,” Rodney gasped glaring at the doctor.
“Keep that on and don’t talk,” Carson ordered before turning to Cadman, “What about you?”
She held up her hand, “I’m fine Carson. Rodney was the action hero in this.”
“Well make sure he keeps the mask on while I report to Elizabeth,” Carson smiled at her.
Cadman gave him a quick smile back before rolling her eyes slamming the mask back onto Rodney as he tried to remove it. She heard footsteps coming and glanced up to see Kim coming towards them. Kim wore a deep scowl when she saw them sitting together which quickly changed to a relieved smile but Cadman had seen the anger in the other woman’s eyes.
Cadman turned to Rodney who was still sucking in deep gulps of oxygen, she noted her hand resting at the back of his neck and realisation hit her. Kim wanted Rodney, Cadman couldn’t understand why but she knew Rodney had broken it off after one date. Rodney moved slightly below her hand, not shrugging away the comfort she was giving and she understood. Kim blamed her for Rodney dropping her, meaning that the friendly Dr Matthews had just tried to kill her.